Flowers
by Teafully
Summary: Hatred is relentless. His grip upon those who wallow in his poisonous fumes is inescapable; not even those whose transgressions have been forgiven are able to break away. Many were known for falling for his lulling lies and comforting justifications... and fate announced that she was only next in line. Rated T-M for language/content. AU with some canon. Reincarnated!87/Hana. SI OC.
1. Butterfly Weed

**Story Originally Started: **March 18th, 2014

**Story Originally Rewritten: **September 9th, 2014

**Times Edited: **8

**Last Edited: **November 4th, 2014

Alright, let me start with a thing that needs to be said. I'm not even gonna warn you all for the long A/N because some of you knew it was coming c:

_(For all you brand-new readers of mine, feel free to jump down to where the chapter starts, unless you like to read long A/N's… which if you do, I like you already :D. I really do. That'll be useful in the future. This one, though, you don't really have to read unless you want to)._

Onward for the returnees: you're all here for my rewrite. Awesome. You deserve an explanation as to why I'm even wasting anyone's time to do so. 

I think that my previous attempt at writing what I think could be an amazing story was _not_ 100%. It was _not_ the best I could do. The characters weren't good enough. My interaction was not the best I could do. Nothing of what I put out there seemed to be the best I could do. I was absolutely torn between soldiering on or rewriting it where I stood. If I had been only 10 chapters in, I would have done it immediately without putting up a poll. Even if I had been only 20 chapters in, I would have done it without any questions asked. No, I was 34 chapters in and I _finally_ decided that I was done losing readers to my second-best. That's right; every time I put out a chapter, _I actually lost more readers than I gained._ That's detrimental to self-esteem, you know? I do appreciate the efforts of both myself and all of my reviewers enough to keep the original on the site, but I have flagged it as discontinued to direct others to this rewrite. If this rewrite doesn't work out, then I will return to it as merely a defeated human being, doubting her ability to write. However, I assure you, this time I will _not_ be defeated by the dreaded writer's block and terrible self-esteem issues resulting in writing less than my 100%, and this time I will not fail. I refuse to fail not only myself but my readers as well with my half-assed writing. This time, I will try harder than ever to show my true potential. I'm not planning on changing the entire story; just improving upon it.

This will not be at all the same thing of which many of you are familiar with, but I kept the base of my plot, so some things may seem familiar.

That's a little serious for Fanfiction, isn't it? I've been known to get too intense...

Alrighty. Take three. Action.

~My Heart Will Go On~

_Warning: Death, gore, exposition… your typical first chapter for a shameless SI-OC-into-a-canon-character reincarnation story._

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><p><span>Chapter One: Butterfly Weed<span>

_A North American milkweed _(Asclepias tuberosa)_ having showy clusters of usually bright orange flowers and a root that was formerly used in medicine. Also known as orange milkweed or _pleurisy root_._

_Meaning: deceit, deception, trickery, and/or fraud._

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><p>It isn't like me at all to care about the feelings of others.<p>

It _definitely _isn't like me to show my love for anyone but myself.

The rest of them call it narcissism.

I call it self-care.

…Err, I suppose that's how I am now. I used to be caring, nice, kind… everything that people like in others, I suppose. I learned the hard way that those traits don't necessarily get you anywhere except for a coffin.

I taught myself that love and stupidity are the same thing, just disguised with different definitions:

_Love__: __an intense feeling of deep affection._

_Stupidity: behavior that shows a lack of good sense or judgment._

While many would come to argue with me and tell me that I haven't experienced true love. How should I know? How do _you_ know? However, I wouldn't know. Tell me; is life staying up night after night and thinking about your own feelings a symptom of love? Is it wondering how on Earth you could be so emotionally attracted to this one person and they seem to complete you? Shortness of breath at the mere thought of the one that you spend most of your time thinking about?

I could go on for hours, but I'll settle at showing you how I lost my life. Rather, how I ended up slowly killing myself; strangled by the idea that I should value someone else's life more than my own.

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><p><em>I anxiously glanced up at the clock, waiting for that minute hand to strike that five so I could get out of school. <em>

_I had been dating this man for a while now; it'd been at least three months since I'd met him on an online chat forum. I had no idea what had come over me when I started not being able to wait when I came home from school to speak to him over my shitty computer. It was only last week when he told me he wanted to see me in person. We didn't live too far from each other, only a 15-minute bus ride away from my home, and I couldn't wait to meet him in person._

_I hope he's just as charming as he seems like he is._

_It wasn't long before the bell finally rung, and my heart soared when I launched myself into the crowded hallway. My high school was considered near-ghetto, but everyone knew how to haul ass after school on a Friday. No one wanted to stick around, and the ones who did were the ones who smoked in the bathrooms and had some real kinky sex anywhere the cameras couldn't catch them._

_After the painful five minutes that I spent maneuvering through the crowded hallways and squishing between people of all shapes and sizes, I avoided the stairs where my friends used to hang out at. After all, they wouldn't understand. I'd never told them about my relationship with David, and I knew that I'd be their Joke of the Week if I did._

_The warm, spring air floated through my long hair and I took a deep breath. The long, cold winter was finally easing away as the warmer weather drew in. The day of April 20__th__ would not only be the best day of my life, but it also could be the day that I discovered if the feelings that I felt were real._

_I caught the city bus just in time, even though I had to chase it for a block and a half. My sneakers (adorned with little stars drawn on by my friends) were a mess from running through puddles from the storm the night before, but the bus driver didn't seem to mind me stepping all over his lunch. All I received was a glare._

_Shuffling to the back, I noticed the characters in the bus:_

_A woman putting on some deep red lipstick with her hair in a neat bun; you could guess that she was either on her way to a hot date or a job interview. Either way, it was something important._

_A man with a newspaper in front of his face stopped to glance my way as I shimmied to the seat behind him, making sure to set my bag beside me in case some stranger decided to get way too friendly. _

_The next stop was mine, however, and I stepped off of the bus on a city street and I proceeded to run through the directions that he gave me._

"_Meet me at the park and we'll go over to my place."_

_I looked both ways; left led to the end of the street toward an apartment complex that looked just a tad under the weather, and the right led toward a grassy area. I trusted my instinct and took the right. My bag swung unhealthily over my shoulder, and I strode down the street self-consciously._

_This was a bad part of town and I knew it, but that wasn't about to kill the curiosity that arose within me. It would take a lot more than stories that happened after dark to scare me away._

_The park was beginning to bud; it seemed to give back the hope that this part of town seemed to go without. The trees were dappled with green and the grass was beginning to grow back much healthier and fuller. _

_My heart began to beat out of my chest as I observed every human being in the park, waiting for David to make himself known to me. I had been waiting a long time for this, and I thought that I would be much happier about it than I was. Instead, I was greeted with a feeling that mirrored fear. _

_I wasn't sure what I had been expecting, and I certainly had seen a picture of him, sure. His most noticeable features were the piercings that he sported on his nose, ears, and lips. The silvery studs were the things that I was waiting to identify. His pale skin and the tight shirts that he seemed like he would wear couldn't be that difficult to find in a park, right?_

"_Hey!"_

_A silky, loose voice greeted me and when I turned around, I felt my heart soar happily. _

_David Wells was definitely a character; tattoos spiraling down both of his arms and percings adorning his face and ears. To some, those are red flags plain and simple. To me, they were nothing of the sort. It wasn't long before I warmed up to him and he to me and we made our way to his house. _

_David lived alone; his mother was hardly home and his father didn't exist. His home was quite small and cozy, much unlike mine, which in turn was larger than this. I liked his house, though; the furniture was well-taken care of and all surfaces were clean. _

_His personality was just like I thought it was. Gentle, caring, and lost. He always seemed to be lost in thought; listening to every sound, every car going by, everything. We held intelligent conversations, but I kept noticing how his eyes wandered away. Whether it be toward the door or the windows, I got the feeling that he was nervous. On-edge._

_Disappointment welled up in my throat, but I soldiered on, trying to find comfort in the fact that I had finally met the man whom I had convinced myself was worth any pain that I felt in the thought that he had his mind on something other than me._

_Was it truly fair that I should value him above all else at this very moment when obviously I was hardly second-best in his own mind?_

_Soon, our conversation dwindled down to nothing. We ceased speaking to each other and I watched as the sun slowly went down. Every part of me wanted to tell him that I had to go home, but I knew that I didn't have the heart to do so. Relishing in our silence, no matter how uncomfortable it was, was good enough for me._

_It was a blur of motion within the next fifteen minutes, but David suddenly told me to go to the back room. Moments later, a loud voice sounded from the front door as David raced to a differing room, emerging with a pistol in his left hand. _

"_Police search warrant, open the door!" _

_My mind raced with possibilities to illusion myself out of this one._

_It's a prank._

_They've hit the wrong house. _

_They're looking for one of his relatives._

_I couldn't even hope to psych myself out when David turned around and told me to hide in the bathroom or something._

"_As long as you don't stay out in the open!" _

_I'd never seen such a personality change before. I'm not sure if it was shock that forced me to stay put or if I wasn't going to leave him after just now getting to know him, but I couldn't bring myself to do what I was told. _

_You can't shoot at the police unless you expect to get gunned down as well._

_That was the only thought that was in my mind at the time, and I couldn't hope to talk David out of this craze that he seemed to be stuck in. His dark chocolate eyes burned into the door as the police screamed at each other and at David to open up._

_The pistol in his hand shone as he fiddled with it behind his back, undecided on what to do. _

_He can't hope to take on the police, could he?_

_I was scared for him; it was only common sense to comply with the rules given to you by law enforcement, and if you refused, it could get you thrown into jail for a very long time. In David's case, I think the punishment could be much more severe. _

_We had to get out. Even if we were surrounded. _

_David didn't seem to listen to me, no matter how much I pleaded to him that he couldn't hope to attack the police. What he must have done to get a search warrant hadn't even crossed my mind in the confusion as I tugged at David's arm, telling him to get out of the house._

_I stared at the back door, seeing that only one man was guarding the back. David must have seen it too, as he took one last glance at the shaking front door and dove for the back door, telling me to stick close to him._

_I did as I was told this time and tailed it behind him, keeping my eye on the pistol that he refused to let go of. The same pistol that I stared at came off of safety as he pushed the door open and opened fire before streaking across the lawn. I followed closely behind, fueled only by adrenaline. _

_We ran without looking back and we could hear them on our tails, but neither of us spoke a word as we tailed it down the street. The thought that did come into my mind was this:_

_How could I have allowed myself to be involved with him? He's a criminal. _

_We ran until we couldn't run anymore and the sounds of police were off in the near-distance. We dove behind a house and into a drainage alley before stopping to think._

"_What did you do?" I asked, gasping for my breath as David looked around, pulling his shirt up to wipe the sweat off of his face. _

"_Something I'm not proud of. The hell are you running with me for? If you tell them you have nothing to do with it, they'll let you go." _

_I couldn't answer him; he was right. It was much too late to say I wasn't involved, no matter how much I really wasn't. I had already evaded the law, and now I was fraternizing with the offender. _

"_You never told me this!" My voice was beginning to rise, but David shoved me forward as the voices and sirens grew nearer._

"_It doesn't matter! Get the hell out of here!" _

_A feeling, one of something mixed with fear and whatever courage I had summoned up, arose in my throat as I groped for the pistol in his hands._

"_I can do it! You can escape, and I'll do it."_

_David looked baffled, but I had caught him off-guard, snagging the pistol from his grasp. He looked down at my hands like he was surprised, but a small smirk curled into his features._

"_I'll find you when you make it out. Thanks!"_

_With that, he sped off. _

_I was unsure how to feel as I watched the beautiful boy sprint down the drainage alley and disappear from sight. The words that he had said were very encouraging, but the way that his face curled up was… intimidating._

_Nonetheless, I froze when an agitated voice told me to do so._

"_Freeze!" _

_I turned to see one of the boys in blue pointing his own gun at me. I was still stuck on my decision and wondering if it was the right one. I was no hero. How did I expect this to end? I'd never even held a gun in my life, and here I was, expecting to face-off with a man who had trained for days on end to be able to use it efficiently. _

"_Put your hands above your head!" _

"_Drop the gun!"_

_I slowly felt the gun in my own hand wiggle as my own hand twitched in shock. _

_I needed to drop the gun._

_Drop the gun._

_That's all that it would take._

_More police had begun to show up, threateningly pointing their guns and tasers my way. Every single one of them seemed to scream "Drop the gun!" as I waited for my brain to process a response._

_David trusted me to hold them off._

_I couldn't let him down. _

_With that, I slowly rose my arm, but the last thing I heard was the horrid sound of bullets flying through the air and the swift, unbearable pain that gripped my entire body. It only took a moment._

_Within that one, final moment, the only thing I could imagine in my head was David. Not my family or my friends. Not my pets or my favorite things to do._

_David._

_How that smirk wasn't a thank you; it was the triumphant smile of a boy who had successfully used someone else._

_The last thing that I had managed to do in life was be used by someone who never truly cared about me._

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><p>It truly reminds me of that Titanic movie, the way that I died. Sure, what a sad day in history. People from all over the world died from all sorts of different classes. I'm sure the whole world mourned that day.<p>

However, those sister ideals of love and stupidity destroyed Jack and Rose and they also destroyed me. If I had realized that I should have been caring about myself rather than others, I would have never gotten myself into that mess.

You'd have to be an idiot to give your life to make sure your 'other-half' survives something that you'll never get out of; something that ends your own life. I realized _that_ much too late. Some people are just naturally caring and I sometimes wish I was like that again. It drives a lot of people away; being blunt and putting yourself before anything else. If only I had shown that side of me to David sooner. I wouldn't be _dead_, that's for sure.

Now, I've never been religious and I'm not saying that's a good or a bad thing, but when I died, I thought it was over. I thought I'd just be dead and it'd be like an eternal slumber that I would never hope to awaken from.

Unfortunately, my journey wasn't over just yet. In fact, it'd only just started.

Reincarnation seems to be life's little sister in that case; it likes to copy its sister and do exactly what it did to me before, but in a much more difficult and sloppier way. It made sure that I was reborn with the fears that lead to my death and it formed a world around me that would prove to lead me down a path that many do not wish to follow.

Sometimes, though, you don't seem to have much of a choice.

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><p>"<em>Because of your willingness to sacrifice your life for someone who would not have done the same for you, you have earned yourself another chance to live. In exchange for this second chance, you will gain fears that you never had in your previous life and your current memories will be erased."<em>

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><p>"You're absolutely <em>sure<em> there were no complications?"

A man stood at the counter of a hospital, wringing his hands and straightening his outfit. He hadn't been in-town at the time of his faithful wife's labor, and he had caught the first plane back to Namimori to visit her. On the way, he had picked out a handful of red roses for her.

"Yes; it was a textbook birth. You have yourself one healthy child, sir."

His red-headed nurse smiled, tight-lipped and fake, as if she had to do this exact same thing every damn day.

"May I–?"

Before he even got the chance to ask, the woman had already begun typing on her computer.

"Of course. Your wife's name?"

"Kurokawa Akahana."

The woman typed at a relatively slow pace and it seemed like eons before she looked back up and came out from behind the counter.

"Follow me."

The walk was relatively short and they came to a room at the end of one of the halls, where the woman turned to the man. He smoothed his brown hair back as he smelled the fresh roses in his grasp. He was absolutely sure his wife would love them.

"Thank you." He dipped his head to the nurse and she allowed him inside where his wife was calmly lounging with their child. It's eyes were open, but he could hardly believe how much the child's facial features mirrored the woman who had birthed her.

"Masato, come greet your daughter."

Masato tensed immediately, placing the forgotten roses upon the table beside her.

"Daughter? I thought they said we were having–"

"A son, I know." Akahana still sounded quite weak from her ordeal, but her eyes were regaining their usual spark. "I'm glad that it turned out this way, though. Now, we can go shopping!"

However, Masato couldn't share the woman's joy. Every plan he had had been for a son. Every thought he had about his new child was how the two would spend their quality time together… not for a girl, who would be bound to have womanly issues that they couldn't connect over and an attitude that would make even the snobbiest seem like a doll.

"Masato? What's with that look on your face? Aren't you happy? Here's to the endless nights of staying up and listening to her cry!"

Akahana laughed again, touching her nose to the child's, before looking up again to see her husband's troubled face.

"You wanted a son, I know… why don't you name her?"

Masato looked at his wife once more, and back to his newborn child.

"She looks like you… we could name her after you."

The child gaped its mouth into what looked like a gigantic yawn, causing Akahana to laugh once again.

"She's just as tired as I am! I'm glad you dropped by when you did; I might have been asleep if you had taken your time."

Masato stared into Akahana's icy-gray eyes before looking back to the child, and he finally reached out toward his wife.

"How do you feel about the name 'Hana'? It will remind me of you every time I say her name."

Akahana paused to wipe her own hair out of her face before turning back to her newly-named child, Hana. Her eyes were closed, but her breathing was very steady, as if she was asleep already.

"Kurokawa Hana… it's a beautiful name, Masato. I knew that you would choose something fitting."

Masato only managed to stare back, watching his own ambitions melt before his eyes. What he had hoped to accomplish had just been turned upside-down. However, he only watched his daughter snore softly in silence, reluctant to voice to his own wife exactly what this meant for the both of them.

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><p><span><em>Author's Notes:<em>

_I'm sure you have some questions, but I'll try and answer the ones that seem the most pressing at the end of every chapter so I don't have ten people asking me the same thing! :D I've seen other authors do this on this site (I'm not sure about this fandom, though…) and it reduces the same question being asked ten thousand times (I've checked!) so hopefully the same works for me._

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><p><span><em>Q&amp;A:<em>

**Why didn't you mention the protagonist's real name?**

Believe me, that's an important point for later in the story! It'd spoil _**everything**_ if I revealed it now. :D

**Does she know anything about the KHR world?**

Her memories were taken in exchange for another chance at life, remember? So, if she did, she still wouldn't know a thing. Personally, I'm not a fan of the whole 'I know what's going to happen so I'm going to do that' and then it causes a whole butterfly effect and then they end up doing a canon-rehash and I just… ack. This is my personal take on it. :D

**What's with that backstory?**

I thought it was unique. I mean, think about it; someone who has never experienced 'love' before and over-estimates their feelings to please someone else… this time going rather extreme… I actually liked it, even if (personally) it seemed a bit rushed. Then again, it was a backstory. c:

**Some of this seemed really familiar! Did you mean to do that?**

I know! I am keeping some things the same and adding onto them. I also plan on changing some things around, so don't think that _everything_ is going to be the same. Don't worry about it! :D

**Why is Masato all… I don't know, mopey at the end?**

Have you ever expected to get something and then ended up getting the _exact_ opposite? He is disappoint.

**Weird chapter name, huh?**

Yeah, but I've decided that I'm going to have all of my chapter names be named after flowers! As lame as that sounds, I have a plan for it... c: I have also decided to put descriptions of these flowers and their meanings behind them in the title. I hope it doesn't look too busy!

**(Off-topic, but) Are all of your A/N's going to be this long?**

Hopefully not! However, I do this thing every five chapters (those who have read the first version know this!) where I put up the current statistics of the story at the top… those can seem long to some. They're mainly for me to look at when we finish the story, but I bet it's interesting for the readers to get a glimpse of where we're at as well! c:

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><p><span><em>Author's Notes Cont.:<em>

I hope that I have somewhat redeemed myself already. Expect another update soon. c: I'm not sure how I felt about the 'backstory' thing in italics, but…

Thank you for giving me another chance (if you are one of those!) and thank you for trying me out (if you are one of _those!_).

_Please leave a review on my progress thus far:_ I would love to know what you all think! I will also be answering all those who are not obviously rushed (ie "update soon pls") with a PM. Looking forward to meeting you all/rekindling with some! Reviews are the _driving force_ of updates; please use that to both of our advantages! :D

~Teafully~


	2. Ivy

**Posted: **September 27th, 2014

**Times Edited:** 8

**Last Edited: **November 7th, 2014

**Thank you to user ishdirections for being my 1****st**** reviewer! :D**

**Thank you to user Jessy (Guest) for being my 10****th**** reviewer! :D**

I actually _loved_ that first chapter. I don't know what it is, but that backstory actually sets the tone like _hell_.

I'm surprised; I've gotten 40 favorites and 58 alerts already, _plus_ a whopping 13 reviews… y'all killin' me. I honestly didn't think I'd get this far already. Thank you all!

I improved on the summary. I like this one _much_ better than the last one!

~Promise~

_Warning: Informational/expositional chapter (ie kinda boring) and me trying desperately to write well in third-person. I don't know how to be funny; I'm working on it. Don't forget foul language, too._

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><p><span><em>Flashback:<em>

"_Kurokawa Hana… it's a beautiful name, Masato. I knew that you would choose something fitting."_

_Masato only managed to stare back, watching his own ambitions melt before his eyes. What he had hoped to accomplish had just been turned upside-down. However, he only watched his daughter snore softly in silence, reluctant to voice to his own wife exactly what this meant for the both of them._

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><p><span>Chapter Two: Ivy<span>

_While this plant is not necessarily categorized by many as a flower, it certainly has it's very own way of stealing the spotlight. Ivy can grow up to 90 feet tall and it is recognizable by its bright-green leaves. Some kinds of ivy are poisonous and that can be determined based on the leaves and how they look. _

_Meaning: friendship, fidelity, and/or affection._

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><p>I made my humble way down the street to prepare for the long walk back to my house after a butchering day of school. While I'm a good student who never truly slacked off on my studies, I had no stellar track-record with administration.<p>

Just today, I had started off the year with a well-earned detention that came about from mouthing off to my teacher. Accompanied with a restless home life and an infuriating school life, I had to accept that I had only set myself up for social failure.

This is just the life of one Kurokawa Hana.

I gently pulled out my phone as I turned onto my street; it was a gift from my mother, and I had promised to take special care of it because I don't usually get nice things. Quickly, I began to scroll through a story that I had been recently writing. All I really did when I walked home was check for errors before posting my story online, but not before seeing a red "1" symbol pop up at the top of my screen, indicative of a new email.

_1 Unread Email_

_Mother_

_Re: hello daughter!_

_How've you been, Hannie? I'm sending you this from work because I won't be home in time for dinner. How was your first day of school? Your father will be home tomorrow morning! He will be flying in late tonight; he's on vacation! Won't this be nice? _

I couldn't resist a sigh in contempt at the final part of the text and I nearly relented myself into ignoring the entire thing.

No; it _wouldn't_ be nice.

The man was practically a stranger to me, as he was gone for work most days of the year. In total, he came to see his family for maybe a week out of every month, which usually equated for about three months of the year.

_If I don't answer, I'll be more screwed than I already am! Talk about no breaks..._

Giving into myself, I pulled off to the side of the sidewalk and found myself a nice place to sit for a couple of seconds as I quickly typed my reply:

_Re: hello daughter!_

_I'm fine, but we have some things to talk about when you get home and before he comes home. School is a regular pain and I didn't expect for it to be any different from last year. It's not. I'm almost home and I'll find something in the cabinets to make myself for dinner._

I didn't even bother to answer the final question in my mother's email as I quickly got back up and walked as fast as I could to my house before I had the chance to receive another email. My muscles ached from the journey, and when I did stop in front of my own house, I took a deep breath. Hesitantly stepping inside, I set my bag down near the door before sliding off my shoes. My home was pleasantly quiet as usual; only the humming of a TV in a different room and my own breathing could be obviously heard.

Not a soul was home.

_Good; I can have some time to put my words together before telling her about my day._

It would hardly be news for my mother, Akahana, to hear about what I had done at school to get a detention; the same thing happened a handful of times the previous year. Akahana and Masato had heard a great deal of their daughter's constant attitude with authority at school, but what they could do about it was miniscule.

I began to climb the stairs up to my room to relax before the doorbell rang. The vibrations echoed off of the walls and I paused, contemplating answering it or not. I went with my lesser judgment and stepped toward the white door, opening it cautiously, but I slacked when I sighted my best friend of several years standing there with an equally-familiar boy who happened to be one of the most popular guys at Namimori Middle.

"We waited for you until after your detention ended, but we didn't see you leave!"

Sasagawa Kyoko stood in front of me, her honey-brown eyes pleading and mixed with the minimal anger that someone as graceful and flawless as Kyoko could hold. Our friendship was one of the few things that I dearly treasured, and without it, I knew I would be utterly lost.

"I didn't see you guys, either," My dark eyes wandered up to the face of the boy standing behind my beloved best friend, and he waved self-consciously. "You've brought Yamamoto over, too?"

While I have never been particularly close with the most popular boy in my year, he and Kyoko shared a history that I could not... and because of it, they've been surrounded by the rumors of being a "couple". Their statuses as 'popular' didn't seem to help, either. Kyoko's mother and Yamamoto's father are both good friends because of their trades; Yamamoto's father is the owner of a very successful sushi restaurant in town, and Kyoko's mother is the spokesperson for his supplier. They became such good friends that it soon carried on through their children, and because of it, the rumors flew.

"Yes! We decided to come over and see how you were doing after this morning…"

I repressed a sigh before allowing my friends into my humble abode; that morning was bound to start off like any other until Yamaguchi-sensei decided to call on me and ask me about my break from the school year. After repeatedly telling my teacher that nothing important happened and to move on to the next kid, he had asked me the dreaded "what did you do for fun?" question.

Apparently "skinning the carcasses of humans who have shitty opinions and gutting them like the pigs they are through writing" is not a school-appropriate answer, thus landing silly me a solitary seat in detention. At least I had gotten all of my homework done.

"I'm doing great. It was a great way to get this year started; knowing that Yamaguchi-sensei will have it out for me will keep me on my toes and prevent me from screwing up any further."

Yamamoto gave me a questioning stare, but nonetheless settled into my closed-off and comfortable living space and took a seat on one of my family's couches.

"That was pretty intense, too. Yamaguchi was pretty flustered for the rest of the day!"

I laughed at Yamamoto's commentary and Kyoko followed suit, settling herself on the plush couch that Yamamoto had sat on only moments before.

"I think he was intimidated just a little bit; he didn't dare call on me for the rest of the day!"

"Yes but," Kyoko began, tapping her lip with her thin index finger. "What about the rest of the year? Won't he have it out for you, Hana-chan?"

I shrugged, hardly caring, despite the prospect of a miserable year floating above my head. "And? At least I get to amuse myself and the rest of the class at the same time."

Yamamoto allowed himself to smile, tightening his arms around his backpack as he lounged back. I noticed this, but I decided not to say a word about it aloud... not to mention to _Kyoko_. The thought would only bother her; that Yamamoto been acting strange recently. Nonetheless, it was probably none of my business. However, Kyoko was hardly as detail-savvy:

"What's with you today?" The ever-graceful Kyoko asked him, her small facial features bunching up in utter confusion.

Yamamoto himself only gave her a faint smile before getting up and stretching, allowing his navel to peek out from beneath the hem of his shirt. "Nothing! It just feels odd not having practice at this hour. I need to be active!"

Kyoko took that as an acceptable answer as she nodded in understanding, her maple-colored eyes shining with relief; she had bought what I knew to be a cover-up for whatever was on his mind. Whatever it was, though, I knew that he would never have the heart to burden Kyoko with it, just like me.

"If you're so antsy," I turned to Yamamoto with a crack of my lower back as I stretched my sides in turn. "We should go do something. I don't want to sit in my house and do nothing; I finished my homework in detention."

The pair quickly relented to my wishes and they each picked up their school bags before heading out of the door. All thoughts of my family life had disappeared before quickly returning in one instant as my phone buzzed.

_1 Unread Email_

_Mother_

_Re: hello daughter!_

_Oh no! Don't tell me you got into trouble again, Hannie… I don't wish to have another word with your principal. I'm sure there is something in the fridge for when you get hungry. I'll be home at about 9 tonight; God forbid that I finish this paperwork!_

I glanced at the email once more as I headed down the street behind my two friends (after all, a sidewalk only seems to be made for two) and thought over the possibilities.

I could either: tell my mother over email _right now_ about what had happened today.

_Or:_ I could wait until my mother got home and endure the punishment then.

Overall, I chose the latter in a split second as Kyoko turned around to meet my gaze. "Where do you think we should go? Takeshi-kun says that we could go to his dad's business and get a free meal!"

The dark-haired boy only brought his hand to the back of his head to rub nervously.

"I'm sure he'll want me to help out over there. Wednesday nights are always one of our busiest!"

* * *

><p>The trio entered the Yamamoto's place of business, TakeSushi. Back in it's day, it was a popular place to eat (and it still is!), as the sushi served was probably the best in the whole of Japan.<p>

I quickly filed in behind Kyoko who followed Yamamoto into the establishment where it looked comfortable; with only a few customers inside, the building was dressed simply but smelled of delicious delicacies.

"Hey, Pop!"

Yamamoto's father, Tsuyoshi, turned around and paused from serving a customer to give his son a large, Yamamoto-style smile.

"Very good of you to drop by, son! In fact, I might need some help behind the counter…"

I slowly began to distance herself from the conversation; as Tsuyoshi spotted Kyoko, the conversation shifted to how her mother was doing and a brief story about the good ol' days when Tsuyoshi and Kyoko's mother would stick around for hours just chatting. That was a topic that I could, regrettably, not join into. It was an occurrence that was not often, but it was expected, and I held up my (figurative) white flag.

Instead of moping about how I wished I could have a close relationship with one of my friends, I spaced out and retreated to the front of TakeSushi to pull out my phone to find that I had forgotten to respond to my mother's previous email.

_I wonder what she'll say about me getting another detention... hopefully I won't be skinned alive..._

Just as I began to type the words in my head onto my screen–

"Oof!"

I was suddenly swept off of my feet and I fell down onto the hard, concrete ground as the sound of paper fluttered in my ears in all different directions. My phone flew out of my hands and for a second everything spun around me.

_I hope, for the sake of the flabbergasted frog in front of me, that my phone isn't broken. My mom won't just skin me; after finding out about my detention, she'll eat me alive!_

Quickly, I felt around the sea of paper to the cold, metallic edge of my phone, and I quickly observed by both touch and sight, that my phone was not broken.

_That was a close one._

However, I looked up to my near-assaulter to ask him a quick question:

"Who the hell–?"

"A-ah! I'm sorry!"

A puny voice sounded above all other sounds as the sound of quivering paper muffled. I picked myself up and searched for the one who had knocked me to the ground. A redheaded kid was on all fours, searching for something that he obviously couldn't see. I glanced to my left to see a pair of glasses beside my foot and I quickly handed them over to the boy, who put them on himself and blinked three times before recoiling suddenly.

"A-A _**girl**_!"

I flinched from the kid's sudden jerk and opened my mouth to tell him to stay out of my way, but he scratched his head in a frustrated manner before I even had the chance.

"Ah… my chemistry report is all out of order now! It'll take me forever to put that back… anatomy analysis… I knew I should have…"

For a brief time, I watched this redheaded scatterbrain ramble to himself before he looked up and spotted me once again.

"A-ah! Are you mad? I'm sorr– arg!"

The boy clutched his stomach anxiously, taking deep breaths to calm himself.

"Are… you okay there?"

I tried my _best_ not to narrow my eyes condescendingly, but this kid was honestly _pathetic_. While I barely escaped my own sarcasm, I occupied myself with helping him pick up his papers off of the dirty ground.

"Y-yeah…" The boy stared at me contently before scrambling to pick up the rest of the papers, but I caught a glimpse of something that she couldn't ignore on the front page, sixth line, third word of his research paper that appeared to be for a chemistry class.

A comma splice.

"The hell – did _you_ write this?"

The boy shrunk in his preppy uniform right before my eyes as I continued reading through it for any other obvious errors.

"Y-yes… what – what's wrong with it?"

My eyes sped through every line, speed-reading for more errors as other people walked around the small mess that was made of stray paper on their way home from work or school.

"…You even managed to misspell the word 'synthesis'. I didn't know that it was a thesis was a sin… 'sinthesis'…"

Honestly, I stared at this piece of work in amazement now, wondering how it was possible to screw up _that_ horrendously.

"What…! No, no you're wrong!"

The boy snatched the paper from me, nearly leaving me with a paper cut, and reread it quickly. His deep-green eyes scanning the paper just as I had, before the defiant look vanished from his face just as quickly as it had come.

"I didn't know there were any errors! I had to hurry and get it done so I could study for anatomy…"

I stared at the kid as menacingly as I could muster up for only a moment longer before deciding to let it go. After all, it wasn't my grade and therefore it really wasn't my problem.

_I've got my own problems that I've got to worry about; particularly my mother skinning me alive._

"C-could you edit it for me? I mean, you saw the errors and…"

"What?" I stared at him until he shrunk in his uniform again. Gee, that sure was fun. "From the looks of you, you look like you go to that private school for the smart kids… what was it, Yumei Middle? Anyway, if you go to a prestigious school like that, why would you want someone from Namimori to edit it?"

That stopped the kid entirely in his tracks, but the fear in his gaze was replaced by a guarded stare.

"I might be smart, but that doesn't render me a stubborn piece of unused toilet paper when I know I need help."

"Unused toil–? _Seriously_; what _is_ your thought process?"

I had to _fight _to hold in a much-deserved laugh at this point. A smart student – an absolute _geek_ – was formally asking me for help without even knowing my _name_ (and vice versa)… and he expected me to _relent_?

"Forget it!" I shook my head before turning around to walk back into TakeSushi without making a scene. "I'm sure you have other kids at your own school that'll help you; I don't even know your _name_!"

The redhead looked slightly taken-aback, but he recovered quickly enough to take a quick breath before wrapping his arms around his stomach.

"Everyone's got their heads so far up their as-astrology textbooks that they don't bother with others… and m-my name is I-Irie Shoichi. What about you?"

"Kurokawa Hana."

So-called Shoichi nodded politely before finally getting to his feet, rubbing his stomach as if he was in pain. "O-okay, uh, now that we k-know each other, you can give my paper back to me before school tomorrow if you can. It's not due until Monday."

I almost threw the paper back at his sorry little face, but I stopped to think about what the hell I was doing.

_I haven't done ONE nice thing today. Maybe I SHOULD help this poor little mite..._

Even so, I wanted to ask why he kept gripping his stomach like that, but I went with her better judgment and tried my best to ignore it as I forced myself to... _play nice. _

"Actually, I can probably be done before seven tonight if I get home by five-ish. Where do you live?"

That question threw poor Irie Shoichi for a loop as he jerked his head backward in surprise. "W-why do you need to know that…?"

"Well, so I can give you your paper so you can start working on it immediately. Is that a problem?"

Shoichi paused before gripping his papers and books tightly, as if they were the only things that he could hold tightly onto.

"My mother doesn't want any girls over at my house…"

"…You just keep getting more pathetic over time, don't you?" I asked flatly, pinching the bridge of my nose as hard as I could. "That's not even sad anymore; that's a whole new level of pitiful."

Without allowing the redhead to answer, I picked myself up and dusted off my uniform before combing a pale hand through my hair and taking the disgraceful chemistry paper off of Shoichi's hands.

"Alright, fine. Meet me in front of my school tomorrow if you wish to have your paper back."

* * *

><p>"Hannie, I'm home! Oh, and today was such a pain; can you imagine having to deal with the most irritating co-workers while attempting to actually finish work?"<p>

Akahana, came through the door at about nine; just when she said she would via email. Her dark-brown hair and icy eyes were only friendly-looking like usual, but I knew that they would not stay friendly for long… not after I told her about my detention earlier that day. While I had finished editing Shoichi's pitiful paper, I only waited painfully for my mother to come home from work to tell her _all_ about my day, only to have to deal with my father for about a week the day after.

"I'm sure that was great, mom, but I've gotta tell you something…" I started, but Akahana only hushed me quietly. "I already know. Your principal emailed me about your disturbance… and I say it was very well-deserved. _However_, that doesn't mean you should have done it. Don't let this turn into last year, Hannie."

Last year was a _ball_; my biggest fault that year was when I destroyed a substitute teacher's hopes and dreams (by total accident this time!) and accidently let it slip that she was teaching the subject all wrong. Little did I know that it would lead to me getting an earful in front of both the principal and my parents because of my willingness to point out simple holes in the curriculum.

"Alright, fine. It won't turn out like last year."

"Good," Akahana smiled before walking away to take her nightly shower. "We'll have to tell your father about that tomorrow, though, Hannie. He'll be home when you come home from school, okay?"

I froze; it was something that I hadn't really thought about prior until now. The dread cloaked me, but I allowed my gaze to drift back to the heavily-edited paper that sat underneath the fading light of the dying lamp beside the fireplace. It was ultimately destroyed with editing; almost every paragraph warranted a major error.

That sight was the symbol of nothing but an image of two teens side-by-side, brought together by an accident (or, clumsiness on one of their parts):

An easily-annoyed, trouble-seeking, average girl and a patient, cautious, brainiac boy becoming friends… acquaintances, even?

Unlikely.

* * *

><p><em><span>Q&amp;A:<span>_

**(Off-topic, but) What about all of your other unfinished projects/stories?**

I've been getting a lot of PMs about this, and I've even put in on my profile; for now, they're all on hiatus. Not _just_ because I'm focusing 98% of my time into this one, but because most of them need a lot more planning put into them. If I get a PM regarding the issue once _again_, I will _probably_ direct you to my profile where everything is bolded (because I know people don't like to read those) _IF_ I answer you at all. I don't like "when are you updating" PMs and neither do other authors, so don't do those. _Seriously_. I don't like to get mad but…

**Yamamoto seems… different. Why's that?**

Well, I'm not a fan of the whole dumb!Yamamoto that other people seem to always do because (personally) he seems like one of the smartest people in all of KHR. I can't say too much right now, but all I'm going to say is that he's supposed to be OOC-like right now. It _is_ an AU-ish story c:

**Irie Shoichi? **

One of the most underrated and forgotten characters in the whole of KHR. I decided to make him a part of the story, and I think we _all_ know what this might mean. Also, since this is an AU-like thing, Irie _will_ hold a rather important role in my plot, and please know that many things may be switched around involving this kid. c: (in other words: there are some questions that I can't answer unless you wanna know the plot) (in other _other_ words, this kid will have some things changed about him, so if it's confusing now, I don't blame you).

**What about the 'fears' that Hana is supposed to receive that you mentioned in the first chapter?**

Woah, woah! Hold your horses; I can't introduce _everything_ in one chapter! That leaves nothing for you guys to chew on! Don't worry; I haven't forgot about them and hopefully it'll be worth it once I find a _*convenient* _place to put it in! c:

**Um… where are we at in the KHR storyline?**

Well, since this is a near-AU, I've been changing some things around which includes some of the timeline (KEEP THIS IN MIND), but it is most _definitely_ before the Varia Arc at this moment.

* * *

><p><span><em>Author's Notes:<em>

It started out rough and then it got better. It was pretty boring at first, but hopefully _that'll_ stop soon. _Like, next chapter soon_.

Thank you for reading! Again, sorry for the long wait! Also, I'm sorry for the late update! I've been editing this for *cough* _seven hours _(mainly because I got HELLA distracted but...)! I'll edit it some more later because I still feel like it needs some more work. Excuse any errors in that case c:

If you can, please drop by a review; it is _**very**_ much appreciated! I love favorites/alerts, too! Again, thank you for reading and I hope all of you will stick around for the next chapter! c:

~Teafully~


	3. Wisteria

**Posted: **October 8th, 2014

**Times Edited: **5

**Last Edited: **November 9th, 2014

**Thank you to user Meishikichiku for being my 20****th**** reviewer! :D**

_I wasn't originally going to put anything up here this time around, but __**I have received my 4**__**th**__** fanart for this fic!**__ I mean, I thought everyone should know that the wondrous (puns!) user __**Gemini Wonderland **__created it for me… you should check it out at the bottom of my profile! Thank you so much; for you have helped me tremendously in regaining the will to write! :D_

~Morning Mist~

_Warning: Bridge chapter (a chapter that is intentionally short to lead into an arc). This chapter starts out boring but then it morphs into 'wtf' and then it's over. I'm sorry in advance for the abrupt ending._

* * *

><p><span><em>Flashback:<em>

_An easily-annoyed, trouble-seeking, average girl and a patient, cautious, brainiac boy becoming friends… acquaintances, even?_

_Unlikely._

* * *

><p><span>Chapter Three: Wisteria<span>

_Flora records indicate wisteria has been known to live up to 100 years and even older (there is a 1200 year old wisteria tree in Japan). Recognizable by their purple flowers and bright green leaves that accompany them. The symbolism of wisteria in the Victorian age dealt a warning of clinging love and understanding that love is the fruit, but our obsession with it will be as choking as the vine._

_Meaning: welcome, longevity, love, endurance, and/or exploration._

* * *

><p>"…Oh, come on."<p>

I stared at the error-ridden paper that I held in my pale hand. Once more, I was confronted with Shoichi's near-subpar grammar skills. After our first interaction five days prior, it had almost seemed like I had become his personal editor… not that that was an accomplishment by any means.

"Is it… really _that_ bad? It took me an hour to come up with it!"

Shoichi's red hair shone in the light as the two of us trudged toward his apartment. His mother was at work in construction from Mondays to Saturdays from nine to five. Within this somewhat friendship, there was only one deal that had been made between us; I had to be gone by the time Shoichi's mother walked right through that front door. That was all.

While I could have brought Kyoko and Yamamoto with me today, the both of them had their own lives; Kyoko with an important family dinner where her relatives had come into town and Yamamoto had to attend a game that evening.

"It's pretty bad, Shoichi. Where'd you get this grammar if you go to Yumei Middle? Are you just doing it to see if I can edit it for you at this point, or…?"

"You _know_ that's not true, Hana!"

I managed to giggle; I had been in trouble today as well, getting sent to the principal's office for my mouth again. While I narrowly avoided detention, I had to watch said principal phone my home and my father had picked up. All I knew was that there would be hell to pay when I got home. However, spending two hours with Shoichi would distract me for just long enough to forget about it.

_Hopefully._

"Wait a minute," I stopped the conversation as a thought raced through my head. "Why doesn't your mom allow you to have girls over at your place, anyway? Is she scared you're going to engage in some illicit activities? Not that you _could;_ she's gotta know you're incapable of that feat…"

"What?" Shoichi gasped, stumbling in his sneakers and regaining his ground, staring at me in surprise. "No! It's not like that, I-I swear!" The kid fumbled for his words as he struggled to hold his chemistry book close to his chest as he blubbered on: "My mother doesn't… she thinks that people will take advantage of me, and she dislikes even the mention of a girl coming from me. I'm not sure why; I guess it's always been like that."

"Really? Tough."

I sympathized with Shoichi for a moment. That _had_ to be annoying as all hell; having someone who disliked you hanging around with certain people being someone you cannot disobey. While I'm not quite in that situation, I quickly thought back to my situation with my family and my own father.

_How great would it be for him to finally leave? If only it was today; we've got two more days until he's overseas again… it can't come any sooner. If I have to spend any more time with that stranger in my house, I'll explode._

"Say," Shoichi pulled to a stop to stare at me, the brown-haired girl who walked beside him, lost in her irritable thoughts. "What's it like in your family? Hopefully your parents aren't as strict–"

"Nah," I answered coolly, pulling myself away from the distance that I began to create between myself and my brand-new friend.

Well, 'friend'.

"They're not strict like your mom. They just always seem to be busy, which gives me a ton of alone time."

It wasn't a lie; my mother Akahana was so fixated with her desk job that she would work on leftover paperwork at the dining room table while we ate dinner together, and my father… was a different story.

"That's good," Shoichi mumbled. "After all, they recognize that you need your own space… right? My mother doesn't… do that…"

I murmured in agreement, but I couldn't help but wonder; what must go on in the Irie family.

The pair of us took a left turn to a rather lavish apartment building with minimal greenery in front of it, decorating the front doors with its beauty and contrast to the grayness of the building. It had all become familiar to me within the last few days, as I spent two hours after school in this huge building with Shoichi.

I entered the building first, racing with a lagging Shoichi to the green elevator which opened to us without even the push of a button, hosting a woman with a fur coat over her shoulders and red lipstick that shone in the obvious lights.

After this becoming a daily occurrence, the stares lasted less time and the two of us threw ourselves into the carpeted elevator and stared at ourselves in the mirror… all of the way up until the sixth floor, where the fifth door on the left opened to Shoichi's simplistic living room. While a two-story apartment was rare in the town of Namimori, Shoichi was proud to say that his mother could afford one to house him in the one room that happened to be up the stairs.

We climbed up the cream-colored stairs to Shoichi's small room, where mysterious papers flew about the room with the gust of wind that the door created when it opened.

"Okay, I'll go ahead and the set of pens that–that you like. My mother likes them, too."

Shoichi shuffled off and left me alone in his small, messy room. He hadn't made his green bed; the sheets were splayed every which way on his mattress. The desk that his laptop sat on was an absolute pigsty; miscellaneous papers spread over all of the available space that his laptop did not take up and broken pencils littered the vicinity. An iPod lay on top of his pillow beside a large pair of headphones, but before I could even wonder what song was on before he had taken off for school, I was distracted by Shoichi's clumsiness.

He had stumbled back into the room, appearing to have tripped over his own stairs as he whipped back around to face me shyly, immediately shrinking in his own clothes as he did so.

"I've got them." I turned to Shoichi, who held a plethora of colorful pens in his hands. "Which color do you want to use today?"

"Let's go with purple," I answered casually, catching the purple pen that flew my way. "I've never met your mom. What's she like again?"

Shoichi tensed on the subject of his family, and I immediately regretted asking about it. "W–well, my mom doesn't like the idea of me going to any average school for my college studies, so she tells me to work extra hard in school so I can go to a good school… she doesn't like me mentioning girls…"

"Why _is_ that?" I clicked the purple pen as she took to the paper she had yet to edit. "There's gotta be a reason for that."

_Ducking from questions doesn't help either of us; sooner or later, he's going to have to face the reality, and I might as well get my curiousity out of the way. That's where snooping comes in, and that's what makes people snakes._

"W–well…" Shoichi's voice wavered enough to cause me to look up, but he had turned away, rummaging through his closet for something. "I have… well, had an older sister, and she was my mom's favorite… but when my dad left, she left with him. I guess that's what started it…"

He griped for something in his closet, digging through comic books to find something, but he pulled out a small picture that didn't look entirely recent, due to its bent corners.

"Here's a picture of her and I."

A girl with auburn-colored hair stood next to Shoichi in the picture with a couple of baskets in their hands carrying plastic eggs. The girl wasn't too much older, but Shoichi looked much like a child with marshmallows stuck in his cheeks.

"Your cheeks are so puffy…" I laughed when Shoichi's face turned a rosy color, creeping ever-so-closer to the red-ish hue that was his hair.

"I know!" He snatched the picture away and carefully piled things on top of it in his closet; things such as clothes, books, and paper. "My mom can't know I still have that picture; she thinks that she threw it away, and just the mention of my sister makes her angry… very angry… I guess that's why girls are off-limits. She never used to be like this."

I watched Shoichi close his closet door all-too-soon, and that's when I took a quick glance to my right. A box about the size of a shoe box stared back at me from the shadows underneath the redhead's desk. I reached for it, pulling on the corner gently.

"What's this?"

Shoichi whipped around and it was only a moment's notice before he snatched my hand away before letting go of it and pushing the box safely back under his desk, sputtering and flailing like a fish out of water.

"DON'TTOUCHTHATWHATDOYOUTHINKYOU'REDOING?"

"_Well_," I scoffed before grabbing at Shoichi's essay that had flown off of my lap in the midst of the commotion. "I didn't know that something so _obviously_ out in the open was untouchable. Sorry."

It was silent as I picked up the purple pen once again and circled the word 'very' within Shoichi's text, purposely keeping the thought of the box out of my mind.

"…What's that mean?" Shoichi had peeked over my shoulder at the obvious purple circle on his paper.

"Word choice. 'Very' is _very_ weak when it comes to word choice in an essay. Why don't you try something like 'extremely' or 'tremendously'? It'd make you look smarter."

The silence was prevalent once again until Shoichi broke it with a question that I didn't see coming:

"How do you _know_ all of that?"

"Common sense, really," I explained while in the process of circling yet another 'very'. "Honestly, I do love to write. It's one of the rare things that I get to do for _me _and I do it all of the time. I guess it carries over into everything I do."

Shoichi gingerly reached for his glasses and took them off of his face, cleaning them with his shirt.

"I feel that – that way about music… I love the band Blood and Peppers, but I'm not sure if I want to be a musician or not, I mean something happened awhile ago and I'm not sure–"

A door slammed shut and a sense of uneasiness fell over me as I stood up, abandoning the purple pen that I held in my hand and allowing the essay to slide off of my lap as I did so.

"What was–?"

"My mom! Oh no – why is she home so early?! This is bad…" The redhead whipped his head around frantically, trying to place his thoughts into order, but he only seemed to panic even more as the stairs near his room began to creak. "H–here! Take the box and hide in the closet! She _can't_ know that I still have it!"

Shoichi shoved the mysterious box into my arms (which it was surprisingly heavy) and I was forced into the closet in a flurry of panic. The door shut and darkness filled my vision as I ceased my breathing for multiple seconds at a time, just in case Shoichi's mother came into his room.

_What did he mean by 'she can't know that I still have it'? What's inside of this thing that's so off-limits, anyway?_

In slipped my hand into the surprisingly-heavy box, and at first touch, I could feel some sort of bottle with some liquid inside of it. It being no use to attempt to figure out what it was, I contented herself to listening to the voices right outside my redheaded friend's room:

"…home early today, mom…"

"I had a meeting… schoolwork?"

My hand wandered around, faintly touching a piece of paper, but I rummaged past that in my fearful curiosity. It was only then when I felt my hand touch something cold.

Cold, round, and metallic.

_The hell is this thing?_

"Shoichi, what is _with _you today?" An irritable feminine voice pierced through me for the first time, giving me a clear idea of just how close this woman was to finding my hiding place.

_She has to be only feet from where I'm standing right now! What if she smells my body spray?_

I quickly pulled my hand out of the box with the metallic, round thing in my hand with the clear intention of getting over my curiosity. However, I sucked in my breath as the voices got louder and closer.

"Nothing, mom! I've just been working on my schoolwork like you tell me to!"

The shrill pitch that he spoke with emitted nothing but utter terror, and sorrow swept through me for a moment, washing away any fear that I had in this current situation. At least one of my parents did their best to understand me, rather than in Shoichi's situation, where one of them was gone and the other scared him to death.

I ran my fingers over the metallic substance once again, and my heart seemed to stop as it slowly slipped out of my hands. My world slowed as I waited for it to make a sound and give my position away.

I waited.

_Hit the ground already._

And waited.

_Just get it over with._

_And waited._

_I am ready to be compromised._

There was nothing to greet me as I took a deep breath and prepared myself for explanining my presence in Shoichi's closet without giving him away, like any friend would. Assuming that we're even to be classified as friends. I mean, c'mon, I met the kid five days ago.

_Just open your eyes. _A feminine voice whispered inside of my head. _There's nothing to be afraid of._

I opened my eyes as instructed, and whatever I had been expecting was no longer there.

There was nothing.

No sound.

No 'GET THE HELL OUT'… nothing.

It was pitch black, but it no longer felt as though I had been cramped up inside of a closet.

The only thing that took my attention away from the darkness was a faint ringing that echoed in my ears so weakly that I wasn't entirely sure I was actually hearing it or not.

In a matter of seconds, my eyes flew open once more as the ringing ceased, and I found myself staring into more darkness. Without being able to make a sound, I seemed to be drowning in the black, gasping and groping for something to hold onto. It was as if desperation was pulling me apart, even if I knew that this episode would not last longer than a few seconds, the loneliness had me begging to be able to snap out of it.

"Who the hell are you and why the hell are you here?"

The sound of those brisk words caused my eyes to open a third time, where the brightness of the room temporarily blinded me, but I snapped out of it when cold metal pressed against my forehead.

Fear left the usually-tough girl that I was useless as I was confronted with something that I hadn't ever been exposed to before; an ultimatum.

"Answer me – or I'll shoot."

* * *

><p><em><span>Q&amp;A:<span>_

**What just happened?**

That's what next chapter is for, silly goose. c: I was originally going to make this chapter a little bit longer, but then I decided that it would be a lot easier if I left everything to be explained next chapter. Horray for bridge chapters! Horray for jumping straight into this part of the plot!

**Why is this chapter so short?**

It's a bridge chapter! A chapter specifically catered to leading into the next arc. The next chapter is planned to be… well, in light of everything that will happen, _pretty _long. You can be sad that it's short, totally fine, but if I get a rage message about it, man, I'm fixing to go off about how I do this for me and how I don't get paid to do this for fun (in other words, I have no motivation other than my own happiness and your own) c:

**-I FORGOT TO ADD THIS IN!- How the hell did that even happen? -if I'm assuming what I think just happened-**

Well, I know that Irie and Lambo had their thing about episode 70 in the anime (you know; where Lambo is a pain and he has to return the box that the Bovino family gave to his family because there were such nice things in it, but Shoichi couldn't seem to get it over there because of how insane the Sawada household was, so he kept the box a secret?), and we're before the Varia arc (probably in the daily life thing to be _exact_), so I'm screwing with the timeline a little bit to make it work. -I hope that was a good hint... and keep in mind that this is an AU-thing!-

**(Off-topic, but) I saw that you receive fanart and I would like to submit my own! How would you like me to do this?**

-I'm not sure anyone would actually ask this question, but I'm gonna put it up here because I know that some people are shy!-

All you really have to do is draw something and put it somewhere where I can view it! My PMs are always on, so feel free to notify me there where I must go to see your art! Also, if you need an email address to email it to because (if for some reason) you cannot access something and want to give it to me anyway, I will provide it for you! If you give me a Deviantart link, I will favorite it on my profile (the link to it is on my FF profile!). _All fanart will get a link on my profile (unless it is emailed to me because I can't post it anywhere without it being my own work, but you will still be put on my profile with the brackets saying [I can't post it on my profile because it has been emailed to me] D:)._ Also, you will receive a shout-out in the next chapter (because I believe that artists of all kinds deserve recognition!).

That was long, but I hope that helps anyone who may have been too shy to ask!

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><p><span><em>Author's Notes:<em>

**I'm sorry that I didn't get around to reviewer replies this time!** I got lazy, I'll admit it! Also, if you ever need anything or want to ask a question, the best way to get a hold of me is to shoot me a PM! I'm always busy, so if it takes a bit, I apologize! :D I just want you all to know that I do read all of my reviews, so don't worry about being ignored or anything! –and I love you all!-

This is a side-note, but I have noticed that former readers and people that don't even read my story have been adding Hana into many of their fics… have I (and _some *cough* XD_ others!) helped make her known to the fandom for the first time? The thought is _baffling_.

If you haven't already noticed, I have been taking my time on these chapters. It feels great c: I'll try to make the next chapter a little longer! I apologize for any errors!

_Don't forget to check out the wondrous (I can't stop!) user __**Gemini Wonderland**__'s fanart that I mentioned at the top of the chapter at the bottom of my profile! It's cute and worth it, guys! Thank you once again from the bottom of my heart! :D_

**Please review on my progress so far! I don't do well with just one opinion (my own xD). Don't forget to favorite/alert! I'm still kinda nervous about my plans in the long run, so anything will definitely help me to find my footing! I'll try to do replies this time around xD**

~Teafully~


	4. Teasel

**Posted: **October 17th, 2014

**Times Edited: **5

**Last Edited: **December 16th, 2014

**Thank you to user Nakamura Misheru for being my 30****th**** reviewer! :D**

_**Guess who just received their 5**__**th**__** fanart for this story? This kid. Thank you bunches to user MirikiaL who has created a wonderful fanart for me! While they have emailed it to me (so you lovely readers can't view it q-q) a full description is on my profile! Thank you again! :D**_

~Joys of the Heart~

_Warning: Foul language, violence, weapons, a longer chapter, sort-of boring (personally), exposition of this arc… the like._

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><p><em><span>Flashback:<span>_

_"Who the hell are you and why the hell are you here?"_

_The sound of those brisk words caused my eyes to open a third time, where the brightness of the room temporarily blinded me, but I snapped out of it when cold metal pressed against my forehead._

_Fear left the usually-tough girl that I was useless as I was confronted with something that I hadn't ever been exposed to before; an ultimatum._

_"Answer me – or I'll shoot."_

* * *

><p><span>Chapter Four: Teasel<span>

_Any of various stout biennial plants of the genus Dipsacus, of Eurasia and North Africa, having prickly leaves and prickly heads of yellow or purple flowers. Used to produce a napped surface on wool and other fabrics._

_Meaning: misanthropy, cynicism, pessimism, doubt, and/or suspicion._

* * *

><p>"Well? You're staring like you don't know what the hell you're doing, stupid kid. Who are you? A spy?"<p>

I opened my mouth to answer the large brute that stood in my way. The coarse fur that was Shoichi's carpet had disappeared from beneath my toes and a slick, wooden floor had replaced it.

Nothing came out of my agape lips, and the man before me only toyed with what I knew was no toy. A real gun; more than likely stocked with _real_ ammo that had a _real_ potential to kill me. Just like in those god damn movies that I had seen but never really taken to heart. Frozen, I waited for the large man to lose his patience, even though every muscle in her body screamed at me to run.

_Stay, die._

_Run, live._

_Speak, live._

_Silence, die._

The broken thoughts clouded together within my mind, making it nearly impossible to tell left from right and right from wrong. The gun shone in the light as the large man became clearer to my eye; his golden eyes – yes, _golden _– burned into me with every waking second that seemed to pass. They contrasted beautifully from his dark hair and his tanned skin, of which happened to be the hue of a freshly-brewed cup of breakfast tea… the same kind that I had had that very morning before I left for school.

"What the hell do you think you're playing at? Are you mocking me? I'll blast your brains out of your goddamn head!"

The patience that this man possessed, who didn't seem any older than his early twenties, was beginning to slip from the state of little to the state of nothing. I opened my mouth once again, closing my eyes shut as I stumbled away from the likes of him.

"I'm not doing anything wrong!"

"To hell with that – how the hell'd you get in here? We're under strict lockdown and we have been for the past week and a half! How could some stupid kid like _you_," he waved his gun with emphasis to and from Hana's face, hardly missing her nose. "make it into _our_ headquarters without any motive?"

Okay, who was on the hard drugs here?

I haven't done anything wrong; I had only been hiding from Shoichi's mother so that my friend and I wouldn't get caught in the midst of our conversation, but now I was standing in front of a man with a _gun_ who was threatening to shoot my brains out… and then there's another question:

Where the hell was the closet that I had been hiding in?

Logic itself was becoming distorted as I struggled to keep my voice steady: "I don't know what you're going on about! I was in the closet and now I'm in an open room!"

The golden-eyed man let out a breath exasperatedly as he cautiously approached me, getting close enough for me to smell his breath, which caressed my face and left only the scent of licorice lingering in the air.

"_Bullshit._ Kid, you're dead! I'll feed your decomposing body to the rats that live in the sewers if you don't tell me what the _fuck_ you're doing in here!"

His hand tightened instinctively on his weapon when I took a deep breath. "I was just having a conversation with Shoichi and now I'm stuck here!"

The man's golden eyes widened before he relaxed his weapon-wielding arm for a second without putting it down. He proceeded to look me up and down, muttering something under his breath before speaking directly to me:

"Shoichi?"

I watched him relax for a moment, but he tensed once more when I began to speak:

"Yes, Irie Shoichi. He's some nerd kid that I met the other day who asks me to edit his papers for grammatical errors, but now you're pestering me and waving that… _thing_ in front of my face like a madman!"

I couldn't even seem to bring myself to utter the word '_gun_'. While I don't know firsthand how much damage that those weapons could cause in the hands of the wrong person, I _do_ know that guns are used for execution, whether it be person or animal.

The man lowered his gun down to his sides and stared at me with the most bewildered stare I've ever seen. It was almost as if I had spoken an entirely different language to him for a split second and he was asking me to explain myself, but he shook it off before asking a surprising question in a much quieter, curious voice:

"How do you know Shoichi?"

"I just told you!" I felt like a loaded pistol as I began to get frustrated now; this man was pestering me for no reason, not to mention that I have to somehow find my way back to Shoichi.

_Maybe I fell through a trap door or something... _

"We met a couple of days ago and I edit his essays for him, and even though his grammar is utter shit, we still get along! Can I go home now?"

"What the hell are you taking me for, a fool?" The man asked suddenly, looking much more dangerous than before as I got a quick glimpse of two piercings on one of his ears when he shifted positions to hold up his left hand to his face, scratching his chin. "What business does he have with some kid? You're a _spy_, aren't you?"

My head was beginning to spin. I can't believe what the hell I'm hearing.

"What kinda stuff are you on and where do I get some?" At this point, I can't even resist the sass in my tone as I laughed it off as crudely as I could, assuming that whatever was happening was some sort of fluke. "I don't know shit about spying. Besides, how do _you_ know Shoichi? He doesn't seem like the type of guy to talk to strangers."

"We're not strangers to him, and if you keep pretending like you know him, I'll break your neck." He responded sharply, cracking every knuckle in his left hand one-by-one, as if he was threatening harm to me silently. "Now, tell me what you're doing here or I'll shoot you."

_I wish he would stop saying that…_

Uneasiness crept into my skin, giving me goose bumps; whoever this guy was, he was making me nervous real efficiently. I don't need to be an expert to see that he's dangerous, and he sure acts like he is for those who can't seem to get the message. Whatever's going on here, he means business.

"I don't know!" I burst out, my frustration reaching its peak. "I'm just looking for Shoichi and I don't know where the hell I am!"

Every muscle in my body told me to run again; wherever I was and whatever I'm doing… everything within the vicinity of me seemed dangerous.

However, this man with the golden eyes – Golden-eyes, as I had elected to mentally address him – rolled his eyes in frustration that was probably synonymous to watching a toddler pitch up a temper tantrum. Of all things that I had expected to happen within the next few seconds, my guess would have been for him to fly off the handle and call me a liar. However, I never expected for him to do what he did:

"Ah, screw it. He'll know what the hell to do with a lying little troll like you. Fine, come with me. Pull anything and you won't even know what hit you when you're laying in a pool of your own blood."

Golden-eyes had cooled down, and I decided that I wasn't about to wait until he got all revved up once more, so I followed his lead… even _if_ I had to bite my tongue at his 'lying little troll' remark.

* * *

><p>Shoichi breathed out a sigh as his mother finally disappeared from his room, leaving in haste while shouting back at him that his homework had better be finished or he'd never see the light of day.<p>

"_How frustrating…"_

The redhead raked his fingers through his hair, adjusting his glasses as they began to slip off of his head, and he continued toward the closet slowly, wondering just how Hana had managed to be so quiet throughout the time that his mother spent yelling into his ear.

_"With her personality, I'd have thought that she would have come straight out, ready to give my mother a taste of her own medicine or something to that effect... I'm surprised she stayed this calm..."_

"Hana," Shoichi quietly edged toward the door handle. "Um, I – I think I can find a way to sneak you out, but we had better hurry, or she'll come back…"

He reached for the closet door timidly, expecting the girl to burst from the loins of the wooden door any second, but not even the sound of her breathing made it through the wood.

"Huh?"

Shoichi opened the door quietly and slowly, expecting his friend to jump out and scare him… or even worse, be incapacitated on the carpet floor, but what he _wasn't_ expecting to see confronted him in the moment.

The closet, empty as can be, stared back at Shoichi as the realization dawned on him.

Hana wasn't here.

She was gone.

* * *

><p>I forced myself to stay still as the golden-eyed man took hold of my hair, pulling me through a dark corridor in the building that I had suddenly appeared in. While there were lights in the hall on the walls, they weren't on, and therefore, it was like she was swimming in that darkness once more. Questions swirled in my mind in no particular order, but when I looked up at the man who was practically <em>dragging<em> me down this dark hall, I could see a deep tiredness in his eyes… and it wasn't the type that went away with sleep.

"You look like you've had a rough day," I tiptoed around the subject and took a deep breath to make myself seem more professional than I had been earlier, trying not to make him angrier than he probably already was. "It's not me, I hope?"

"If it _was_ you, you'd be dead." Golden-eyes betrayed a hint of something other than anger in that moment when the strength in his voice faltered _dead_.

"Give it a rest with the 'death' and 'I'll kill you' crap," I jerked my head in his grasp, trying not to rip all of my hair out of my head. "It's not like you'd actually joke about that stuff if it happened to one of your family members or something…"

Golden-eyes let go of my hair and whipped me around to face him. I shivered when I witnessed the fire in his eyes as he forcefully grabbed my hair once more.

"Yeah, sure; it's not like I don't _live_ with it every damn day or anything. I suggest you not try me, kid. I'm not in the mood for this shit."

It was then when I noticed the waver in his voice, the slight break in the strength that he had shown me so far. There was something wrong, I realized as my brow crinkled together in thought, and what it could have been was well beyond my comprehension.

"Wait here."

Golden-eyes instructed me when the two of us came to a stop only paces later, and I did as I had been told even though if I _did_ pose an actual threat, Golden-eyes would have just made a huge mistake.

_If I was an actual menace to society, I could have run off by now without being told to stay still… or maybe it's because I'm just a 'kid'. Adults and their labels…_

Even though the prospect of moving and walking around like I was specifically told _not_ to do was extremely tempting, I knew that if I so much as _thought_ about it, I would probably end up shot.

The thought of that caused me to shiver:

Being shot.

The act of shooting a gun, even.

Maybe even as far as guns in general.

I had never truly felt uneasy until I had watched Golden-eyes hold that gun in front of my face, waving it around as if he were actually going to kill me. Oddly enough, it wasn't the 'killing' that put me on-edge; it was the gun itself. How it was manufactured to kill people and/or animals. No matter what way you spun it, that was what it was for. Self-defense, hunting… it all led down the road of death… and instantaneous death if you wanted to get more specific with it.

"Okay, kid. Follow me."

Golden-eyes had reappeared, and my dark eyes wandered to the holster on his hip. The dark weapon stared straight back at me, but I refused to allow him to sense my fear. Instead, I stood up straight and followed him silently down the hall to a rather decorated door. While there was nothing telling on the door, I could hear music humming softly through the cracks in it.

"I've got this kid. She claims that she knows you, but I feel like that's bullshit, so I'll let you decide for yourself."

Golden-eyes opened the door for me, shoving me inside before allowing himself in, but he rolled up his sleeves as he took a hold of her hair once more.

"What – are you scared I'm going to run away?" I asked through gritted teeth, but I received no answer as another man came out from what she assumed to be a closet.

His bright-red hair shone in the fluorescent lights, but it was in that very instant that I recognized who the man was.

A small, tight whisper weaseled through my lips as I took in the much more mature facial features of the scared, mama's boy that I had only met five days ago.

"I didn't even realize you could get even nerdier than before."

The thick-rimmed, dark-as-night glasses that he wore framed his face well, compared to the thinner, beach-sand tan ones that I had become used to in the short five days that we had known each other. Those bright-green eyes that I recognized were the same, but only shadowed by doubt and something else that I couldn't quite read into.

_This couldn't be the same kid that I saw only moments ago, right? I've got to be going insane. There's no way that that's even possible._

Our eyes met and I jerked away from Golden-eye's sudden tightening grip on the dead cells upon my head.

"Want me to get rid of it or not?"

"'It' yourself." I huffed, earning another jerk of my head.

A sharp retort came across my mind, but I stopped myself just in time as the familiar, cold metal pressed against the back of my neck, sending a shiver all through my hair and my toes.

"I haven't been _joking_, kid. Don't test me."

The lulling hum of music in the room was almost soothing.

_Almost_.

It's like the feeling of comfort some morticians get around the bodies of the deceased; the room is full of people with different scars, stories, and goals… but none of them can speak. The only sound was that of the calming music, filling the voids where the sounds of voices cannot.

"Dante, calm yourself, seriously. It's just a kid. Maybe it's lost."

The man that I knew to be Shoichi shrugged me off, hardly giving me another glance. It was almost as if he had other things on his mind that were much more pressing than I.

It started with a giggle, which morphed into a snicker, and finally took its full form as a laugh. No matter the seriousness of his tone, I outright refused in my inner mind to believe that _this man_ was the _same boy_ who had the quiet, awkward sense of humor that I knew.

"What are you laughing at?"

Golden-eyes – or, Dante as Shoichi had addressed him – had reacquired his tight grip on my hair as I continued to laugh. There was no way that he had grown to be as tall as he was in such a short time and there was no reason why he had to act like he was somebody. As far as _I'm_ concerned, he's just a boy who had no idea how to talk to women... or _anyone_, to be honest.

"How did _this_ happen?" I asked as the laughter died out and I replaced it with my wits.

Shoichi knitted his eyebrows together, but his gaze didn't leave my face. It was almost as if he was searching for an answer, but he kept his mouth shut as he silently moved toward his bed and picked up something that was lying on his bedside table. I couldn't see what it was and I didn't even have a guess as he stole another glance at me and turning straight back to Dante.

"I'll take care of this."

Dante obeyed immediately, taking his leave and placing his weapon back into the holster on his hip.

"Alright. I'm gonna go get myself some lunch."

The golden-eyed man backed out of the room calmly, whistling down the hallway as if it–the whole confrontation I had had with him–had never happened. The silence grew between Shoichi and I, and that only made it even _more_ awkward than it already was.

_Does he even recognize me?_

It was the instant when Golden-eye's footsteps disappeared down the hall when Shoichi pushed past me and opened the door quietly, sneaking out and turning back to me briefly.

"Come with me."

Temporarily stunned by the lack of feeling in his voice, I followed him like I was told, but suspicion soon crept up from my unconscious mind as I followed him through the spiraling hallway.

"Where are we going?" I wondered aloud, but the redhead declined an answer as he hurried ahead, not even bothering to check if I was still following him.

Against my better judgment, I followed him as closely as I could, following him through every door that he decided to dash behind.

Left.

Right.

Straight.

Right.

Right.

No, that's wrong. Back up and go left.

Left once more.

Straight.

Straight.

Right.

Straight.

_Just how big is this place? When are we going to stop?_

Stairs spiraled upward as Shoichi skidded to a stop and checked to make sure I was still following him. After that quick glance, he continued up the stairs, skipping as many steps as he could muster.

"You've got to be joking," I muttered as I took my first step upward.

I started up the steps slowly, but when I looked up and saw the glare that Shoichi gave me from the top of the stairs, I picked up my pace, but when I finally got to the top, he was off again. This time, though, it wasn't very far: he took a quick left turn to a seemingly-empty hallway and he approached a door as he stopped. This door, instead of being intricately decorated like Shoichi's, it was a plain mahogany tint without anything special presented on it. The knob even looked to be misused and ready to pop right off.

He slowly turned the knob and the door let out a wail, but Shoichi snuck his way in and I followed. However, he shut the door behind me and leaned against it to prevent me from making my way around him and leaving... assuming that I would have when I realized what he had been holding in his hand the whole time.

I spotted a familiar shine as Shoichi revealed his own gun, and I thought back to the moment when he had picked up something before asking me to come with him. My jaw slacked, but I shook myself and refused to look at the gun, only staring around the empty, dusty room.

_He won't shoot me... he couldn't..._

The floor was covered in a thick coat of dust, and instead of this floor being like the ones downstairs where they were shiny and sleek, this one was cracking and creaky. The only things inside of the room seemed to be a couple of old dressers with beautiful inlays, a dusty couch with a cover over it, and a bed that I could guess was full of bugs and, you guessed it, more dust. The one window in this room was a hexagon that was placed a little out of my reach, but it surprisingly lit up the whole room.

"How did you get here?"

I turned back to Shoichi, whose gun shivered in his grip as he pointed it my way.

_He won't shoot me._

"I don't know." I shot back, forcing myself to stop looking at the killing machine in his hand. "Could you put that thing down? You're making me nervous."

My voice shook with effort, but Shoichi surprisingly relented and lowered his weapon, allowing his hand to slack along with it. He noticeably relaxed once the weapon was out of the picture, but it appeared that he had more to say:

"Hana, you know who I am, right?"

Shoichi appeared to be choosing his words carefully, lowering his voice to a whisper. I nodded slowly before reaching up and smoothing down my ruffled, dark brown hair.

"Irie Shoichi. We met five days ago, but…"

"…you stepped into the closet and dropped one of the Ten-Year Bullets that was in that box. I remember that day."

Suspicion began to grow in my mind within an instant. How did he _know_? This _had_ to be a figment of my imagination at this point. How did he _know_ about what had happened _just now?_

"How do you know?" It was only a whisper that slivered out of my mouth, but Shoichi stood up straight and his voice was strong as he replied:

"You've traveled ten years in the future, Hana. I'm twenty-five years old right now. It's real, don't worry, but you shouldn't be here. Not for longer than a couple minutes, at least."

_It's been longer than a couple minutes, hasn't it?_

"Am I supposed to trust you?" I asked carefully, eyeing the gun in his slender hand. "How do I know that you're telling the truth?"

After all, by all accounts of logic, what he was telling me had just happened was practically impossible.

"I knew who you were, didn't I?" Shoichi stood in front of the door, standing up straight without a hitch in his posture, unlike the Shoichi that I know... who is supposedly back in the past.

"As if that's enough to make me trust any of the bullshit you're spewing. It's going to take a bit more than that to make me trust you."

I watched a glimpse of concern pass through his features, but it was nothing more than a glimpse as he looked down at me with confidence.

"My grammar is still absolute shit, and if it helps, I break my glasses in frustration when I can't figure out why you're gone for three hours in my closet."

"You can't prove that second part," I retorted quickly. "Does that mean that I get to get out of here in three hours?"

The man faltered for a moment and he genuinely shrugged his shoulders, wrapping his arms around himself as he kicked his foot up against the plain door.

"I don't know. Honestly, I'm not sure why you're here in the first place other than being reckless like always, but if that was the case, you're here for something. I'll probably need to do more research on it."

The degree of respect and lack of scorn that he showed me appeared to be characteristic; something that the Shoichi I knew would do. He quietly stood up straight as I stood atop of the covered couch to get a look out of the window as he spoke.

As the glare diminished, I caught glimpses of trees and flowers scattered about, telling me that it was hardly autumn; the trees had just began to turn color and the lack of chirping birds told me that it was getting colder.

"Where are we?"

"We're still in Namimori, just… a different part of it than you're used to, I suppose."

It was as if he was attempting to keep everything under wraps. After all, I was in the _future_! Just a simple question could tell me how my life was going to shape up!

_If he thinks that I'm going to pass that up, he must not know me very well after all!_

"How _is_ the future, anyway?" I started out guarded; trust wasn't something that this 'Shoichi' had earned easily (or… at all, really…), but maybe if he told me things that were probable about my future (if he still knows me here), I could possibly decode exactly what was going on here.

Shoichi adjusted his glasses carefully, staring straight through me as they locked eyes.

"I'm not sure."

"Liar," I jumped into my offense. "You're here! You _have_ to know _something_!"

"No, I didn't mean it in _that_ way," Shoichi corrected quickly. "I'm just not sure how we _are_. Things are slow as of now, but I'm sure we'll be fine."

There was a certain degree of hidden meaning behind those words that Shoichi so carefully uttered, but I was reluctant to read into them just yet. Too many questions (and not choosing them carefully) could result in not getting any answers whatsoever.

"If you don't mind me asking, what am I like in the future? Do you still know me? Are we still friends?"

_If I ask a lot of basic questions, maybe he'll be more prone to tell me more in-depth stuff._

Shoichi adjusted his glasses for the second time. "You and your sarcasm don't exactly change, and yes, we're still friends, if that's what you'd call it."

"What do you mean 'if that's what you'd call it'?"

I griped for an answer, but Shoichi only shrugged once again, this time turning away for a moment. "I'm not sure."

"_What did I expect? I guess he's always been this uncertain with things! 'I'm not sure' this, 'I'm not sure' that… did I seriously expect to get anything out of him?"_

My frustration came down as quickly as it had flared up, and Shoichi took advantage of the silence by speaking out:

"I'm going to start my research on how you can be in the future for this long. All that I ask of you is to not let anyone else know you're here. No one ever enters this room and this room is not monitored, so you won't be detected as long as you don't move around too much. I'll bring you up some food and a couple of blankets, but just _don't_ be reckless and get seen. Dante probably won't even remember that he saw you; the dumb lampshade doesn't even remember his own name sometimes, so you should be relatively safe. I'll take care of the rest."

"Now I _know_ it's you!" I laughed a little bit, allowing her muscles to loosen up. "You and your shitty sense of humor!"

Though, the image of Golden-eyes surfaced in her mind anyway, even when I was hardly focused on him at all. It could be true; if he had a terrible memory, then he may not remember finding me and threatening to kill me…

_But how do you just simply FORGET that you found an 'intruder' and waved a gun in front of their face, accusing them to be a liar and a spy?_

"Um, can I ask you a question? Last one, I promise." I quickly stopped laughing as I formed a question that I _knew_ I wouldn't get another chance to ask.

Shoichi paused from walking out of the room, taking his hand off of the door knob. "Huh?"

"What is my _life_ like in the future?"

There was a long pause of silence, and I feared for a moment that he wouldn't know what to say.

"It doesn't matter. You won't be able to change it, anyway."

The door shut quietly behind Shoichi, and I sat in a stunned silence that seemed to be so powerful that it could even stop time. What was so horrible that he would even decline to even _speak_ about it? What would my life be coming to?

* * *

><p><em><span>Q&amp;A:<span>_

**WHAT IS THIS?**

This? This is a Fanfiction, silly goose.

**WHO ARE YOU PEOPLE?**

Those… those (and you'll see even more of them later... then again, I suppose the only one you've met so far is Dante) are some people that you will probably become very familiar with to be entirely honest, so yeah. Pick your favorite. Love them. _Cherish them_. _**Soon.**_

**Is this… the plot?**

Well, this is a _part_ of the plot that I had never really thought over in my previous version (more like 'didn't put it in') and yeah. I feel like I've finally gotten all of the kinks out of my reasoning for everything that's going to happen, so hopefully I can write it in an engaging and not-boring way… this arc is going to be kind-of short, but not _too_ short.

**How did Hana manage to get here?**

You know how Irie got some of those bullet things from the Bovino family (which I'm sure they didn't mean to give him) that he used to see what his future would be inside of said box? Well, long story short, she dropped one of those and this happened. (I made them bullet-looking things, by the way, because I couldn't remember what they actually looked like and I didn't want to put the bazooka in because I couldn't remember if there was one or not. I hope no one minds c:).

**Wait a minute… where did TYL!Hana go?**

Hmm, well, that's a difficult one. She didn't switch places with TYE!Hana, so it _could_ (and I'm not saying that it does) imply something that I can't really say right now without it spoiling, I suppose… and I'm gonna let you guys use your imaginations for the moment, yo. I can't spill _everything_ about my plot yet.

**We're missing some of the main characters right now! When will people like Tsuna be introduced in your fic?**

If not in this arc, but the next arc. I feel like people like Tsuna will be mentioned soon here, but if not, he will definitely have a bigger part in the next arc that I have planned (which isn't that far away!). Hold your horses! :D Also, in this arc, I can't necessarily have you all know _everything_ that will be going on in that Future (because that would spoil the whole fic) so, feel free to post what you think, but I can't say whether you're right or wrong!

**What's with the definition of the chapter title at the top?**

I went back through and edited all of my chapters to have the definitions of the flower and what they look like just for my readers! I thought it'd be cool if I did a little extra research for every chapter, you know? While some of the definitions I ad-lib from sources, some of them are completely dictionary definitions. I hope no one minds me being too creative for my own good…

* * *

><p><span><em>Author's Notes:<em>

I wanted to end it a bit sooner, but I decided to give you guys a longer chapter. I'm loving the direction we're going in, guys. It's perfect.

Oh yeah; I do love the constructive criticism that you all are giving me! :D Usually I don't appreciate it because most of the time people say it in such a condescending way that makes me want to respond _realllyyyy _sarcastically and I have to physically hold myself back from my keyboard, but all of you don't do that and it's _GREAT_! Don't be afraid to tell me if something seems amiss, guys! c: I appreciate it!

We've got a stat-chapter coming up next chapter, guys! You can read the stats, but it's something that I do every five chapters to look back on when I finish the story.

_I have updated the submission rules on my profile for submitting fanart if you choose to do so! Please check there if you have any questions, and if your question is not answered there, shoot me a PM!_

_**Again, thank you to user MirikiaL for taking their time and drawing me a fanart! It really means a lot to me! :D**_

**Don't forget to favorite/alert/review! I really appreciate it, guys! I answer all reviews that are not obviously rushed (ie, not one sentence… or 'update pls'.). (Oh yeah… I also don't answer most Guest reviews… I apologize!) Bless people who review every chapter!**

(I say 'guys' a lot, don't I…?)

~Teafully~


	5. Oak

**Posted: **October 26th, 2014

**Times Edited: **5

**Last Edited: **December 16th, 2014

**Thank you to user BrokenAria for being my 40****th**** reviewer! :D**

I know that this may be the first time some of you have seen this, but this is **my five-chapterly-stats** that I always did in the previous version of "Flowers" so I could look back on them and compare. I guess you can look through them if you're interested, but they're mainly for me. Some options that I used to have got taken away because of the lack of it thereof (like Poll Votes) and some have been added because I kept track of it (Number of Edits/Chapter with the most/least edits/fanart). These may seem long, but, meh.

**Flowers's Current Stats:**

**Word**** Count:** 22,346

**Reviews:** 40

**Views:** 1,854

**Communities:** 7 (_Great Fanfictions of all Kinds__, __Hey I'm in the world of KHR!__, __KHR CrossOvers and AUs__, __Literally Reborn!__, __OC Fanfiction__, __Read To Have Fun!__, _and _Reincarnation, Reborn, Reliving_).

**Favorites:** 50

**Alerts:** 72

**Highest Review Count for One Chapter:** _Chapter One: Butterfly Weed _with 16 reviews.

**Lowest Review Count for One**** Chapter:** _Chapter Four: Teasel_ with 5 reviews:_  
><em>

**Chapter with the Highest Word**** Count:** _Chapter Four: Teasel_ with 5,548 words._  
><em>

**Chapter with the Lowest Word Count:** _Chapter Three: Wisteria _with 3,370 words.

**Fanart Received for this Story:** 5

**Number of Edits Overall: **14

**Chapter with the Most** **Edits:** _Chapter One: Butterfly Weed_ with six edits._  
><em>

**Chapter with the Least Edits:**_ Chapter Five: Oak _with zero edits.

~Homecoming~

_Warning: Foul language, weapons, guns, more characters, and more lame-Shoichi… because we all like that._

* * *

><p><em><span>Flashback:<span>_

_"What is my life like in the future?"_

_There was a long pause of silence, and I feared for a moment that he wouldn't know what to say._

_"It doesn't matter. You won't be able to change it, anyway."_

_The door shut quietly behind Shoichi, and I sat in a stunned silence that seemed to be so powerful that it could even stop time. What was so horrible that he would even decline to even speak about it?_

_What would my life be coming to?_

* * *

><p><span>Chapter Five: Oak<span>

_While an oak tree itself is not a flower, it does produce small flowers that are designated into female flowers and male flowers in the spring. This tree's massive appearance was taken as a sign by the Celts to be honored for its endurance and noble presence. To the Celts, ancient Greeks, and Romans, wearing the leaves of an oak tree on their garments was a sign of special status and honor._

_Meaning: loyalty, hospitality, friendliness, and/or generosity._

* * *

><p>Irie Shoichi found himself at a loss when he stepped out of that doorway and back into the nearly-empty hallway. The dark wood hid everything, including the door that he had just stepped out of, from sight. The panic began to emancipate itself from his mind, forming into something much more terrifying; dread. The gun that he held, the one that he had taken extremely good care of ever since he had bought it, slipped continuously in his sweaty hand.<p>

Forcing himself to keep his cool, he walked on, proceeding to answer his own questions aloud as he usually resulted to doing.

How exactly did she get here?

"The bullets, of course… but why is she _still_ here? There has to be a reason for that… or maybe it's simply a mistake. How could a mistake be made by something like this? Was the bullet faulty?"

Logic seemed to conflict with every scenario that he came up with, but in all actuality, being able to go into the future at _all_ was illogical.

"I need to work on throwing logic out the window because at this rate, anything's possible."

Shoichi had spoken to himself all of the way back to the safety of his own room, careful to go the roundabout way back to make sure that no one followed his route or suspected that he was up to something. After all, the lockdown that they were under was getting underneath everyone's skin and reason was beginning to become clouded by doubt and fear.

He pushed the door open and closed it behind himself, allowing his music to float over the top of his head and calm him down for a moment. Surely Hana–the one that he had aged with–would be okay.

"I wonder if what he said to her… maybe that has something to do with _this_. He went too far this time and now…"

Quickly, Shoichi placed the gun onto his nightstand and scrambled around for a pen and some paper. Grabbing for his laptop, he quickly opened it up and smashed on the keyboard to take it out of sleep-mode and immediately hopped onto his research.

_Query: time travel_

The search came up with a general definition of time-travel… one that Shoichi and many other techies in this day and age had managed to disprove thousands of times over.

"'_Very limited support in theoretical physics' my ass. It's too bad we have to keep that under wraps, though. Time travel is strictly to be inaccessible to ordinary people, isn't it?"_

"You're up early."

A timid yet steady voice stopped Shoichi from typing a different query into the search bar at the top of the screen.

"Who is it that usually works himself into the deep hours of the night only to wake up around dinnertime?"

Turning around, Shoichi quickly rubbed his glasses furiously on his black t-shirt, but even with the blurriness of his sight he recognized one of his friends standing in the doorway to his room.

"Yeah, I woke up early today to get a head start on more work. What are you doing today, Rusty?"

Rusty – this boy was an individual indeed. While he was normally a soft-spoken and nonetheless quiet person in general, if he had something to say, he would say it. The light-brown hair that he possessed shaped his face quite nicely, and a fair amount of his hair did cover his right eye. It wasn't for any particular reason; more because he refused to cut his hair and needed a place to put it all. Even though his hair reached clear down his chin–nearly to his shoulders–Rusty would give one an earful with even the _suggestion_ of a trim. One small braid hung from the left side of his head, tucked neatly behind the bangs on that side. Accompanying his long hair, he had a pair of big brown eyes to go with it, causing discrepancies about his gender wherever he went. Many others would be upset about said confusion about their gender, but Rusty often used it to his advantage.

"I've been working out a little bit… or attempting to. Dante has been showing me how a 'real man' does it… even though I'm almost one-hundred percent sure that he doesn't even know what a dumbbell _is_. I said the word aloud asking him to hand it to me because he was using it and showing me how to use it, and he said "what'd you call me?" I _still_ don't understand why he's like that. He let me take a short break, so I figured to see if you were awake yet."

Shoichi relaxed; Rusty was, and always has been, good company in stressful situations. Even though Rusty was twenty-four years old, his baby-face features gave him the soft skin of a prepubescent teenage boy. It was _especially_ prominent in the fluorescent lights in Shoichi's room.

"Mind if I sit in here for a bit, Shoichi? What are you working on?"

"Go ahead. I'm not working on anything; I'm just doing more research on time-travel," Shoichi chose his words carefully, covering up any sense of suspicious behavior that he could possibly emit. "I'm trying to figure out how it works all over again and how you can reset the space-time continuum back to the way it was."

Words tumbled out of his mouth without a filter, and he realized this when Rusty tilted his head.

"I-I mean, I'm trying to figure out how to put time back into place. I haven't figured that out quite yet."

Rusty scratched his chin thoughtfully before taking a seat on Shoichi's bed next to him. A serious air came about the room, changing Rusty's face from content to an expression of seriousness.

"Why; is something wrong?"

"No, not at all," Shoichi lied, looking Rusty in the eye to make it seem believable. After all, he wouldn't understand this conundrum whatsoever. "I'm just… being an incompetent pencil sharpener. I feel like the answer is _there_ but I'm overlooking something."

To his surprise, Rusty laughed it off, giving him a small, shy smile.

"Alright, you just keep insulting yourself with everyday objects. Besides," he paused standing up to stretch and continuing after cracking his neck. "As an answer to your problem, I would think that you would have to right something that went wrong over the course of time to get time to straighten itself out again. That's just me, though. See ya; Dante's going to yell at me!"

Even though Rusty took his sweet time of sauntering to the doorframe and closing Shoichi's door, Shoichi couldn't find it in himself to focus one bit on Rusty anymore. The only thing that rung in his mind was the reality of what he had said:

Right a wrong.

Time will straighten itself out.

The answer–like Shoichi thought it would be–was truly plain and simple… not to mention that he never would have found it _because_ it was so elementary.

* * *

><p>"That's mouse number ten. Do we have a challenger?"<p>

I sat in the dusty, cluttered, dark space that my childhood friend had instructed me to _live_ in. Ten mice have come and gone, with no obvious indication that they were even different mice.

"Who'd have thought that he'd even grow up from being the kid that he is now?" I muttered to myself, scoffing at the thought of how Shoichi really _had_ shaped up. "Here, I thought he'd be totally different than he is…"

Up in the room, even if I had only been there for an hour, it was nothing but dust and mice. There was nothing to do other than look out of the window, but I was too busy being careful not to move around too much like Shoichi had asked me to do.

The wood beneath me shifted often enough to make me believe that the building that they were in was falling apart, but there were no signs of breaking and/or bending of the boards that held up this part of the building.

"Hana," Shoichi stepped into the room quietly, beautifully-decorated throw blankets adorning both of his arms. "I've brought you some blankets."

"It's about time! I was getting kinda cold up here." I laughed to myself when Shoichi handed the blankets to me and then sat back, watching me lay them about on the floor.

"Um, Hana…" he started, only to falter just when I looked up from adjusting the blankets he had given me. "I'm not sure if this will work, but I've got an idea as to why you're here, in the future. I think it might have to do with something that happened yesterday, when you disappeared."

"Disappeared?" I asked, interested. It wasn't like I could have disappeared in midair _yesterday_; I've only been in the future for an hour or less!

"Yes. I'm not even entirely sure what happened… you and him got into another argument and…"

"Wait, wait," I stopped him there, confused. "Who is 'him' and why are we arguing?"

"You don't…? That's right, you don't know. I…" Shoichi couldn't seem to find what to say whatsoever. "…I don't think I should tell you; causing a butterfly effect could make the future–_your_ future–even worse than it already is… but you and he always fought all of the time and you disappeared yesterday right after telling me not to look for you. You still haven't returned… but anyway, I think older-you went to go see someone who could have screwed up the space-time continuum, sending _you_ here for a longer period of time."

All of the information took a moment for me to process, but it didn't make a whole mountain of sense. "What's _that_ supposed to mean? I fucked up _time_?"

"Don't worry; I think I may have a solution to the problem!" Shoichi looked excited now, and he stuck his hands into the pockets of the jeans that he was wearing, probably to prevent him from looking _too_ excited. "As bad as it sounds, time may _truly_ be messed up and that might factor into the future. _However_, I think I know how to fix it."

"How?" I asked, narrowing my eyes skeptically. Trusting him could either take me back to younger-Shoichi's closet or could lead to my ultimate demise. After Golden-eyes and his carelessness with the gun that he possessed, I wasn't exactly up for an 'adventure'.

A mouse scurried across the floor toward Shoichi's foot, and he glanced down at it.

"Looks like he's number eleven," I muttered, watching it cautiously sniff around Shoichi's foot and slowly attempt to climb atop of it.

"What?" Shoichi asked, keeping his eyes on the mouse that was now beginning to settle itself on the top of his white shoe.

"He's the eleventh mouse I've seen today."

"I hope not," Shoichi scoffed slowly bending down to pick it up. "He's the only one up here. I have elected to call him Squeakers. I saw him the first time when I-"

"…You… really _are_ Shoichi, aren't you? There's _no_ way anyone who tried to fake you could do it so well."

I watched, bewildered, as 'Squeakers' scurried up Shoichi's arm and up to his shoulder, sniffing at his face.

"Are you _sure_ that the mouse is _clean_? You know… like, you won't get any diseases if it bites you?"

Shoichi paused for a long moment. That moment seemed to stretch out for mere seconds, but when he sprung back into action, he quickly put 'Squeakers' back down and he scurried away, underneath the dusty couch.

"No… I wasn't sure if he was clean."

I took a full moment to clear the whole mouse-incident from my mind, but I jumped right back on topic as I combed my hand through my hair.

"_Anyway_, what's your plan? I don't exactly _want_ to be stuck in the future, given that I'd spend all of my time in this dusty room!"

Shoichi scrunched his eyebrows together as if he was thinking really hard about what his plan was going to be.

"I'm not entirely sure, to be honest with you. In fact, I don't even know if it will work, but I'm willing to give it a shot. We'd have to leave this place to do it, and that won't be easy at all. We're on lockdown."

I frowned.

_Why are they on lockdown? Did something happen?_

Before she had the chance to ask, Shoichi quickly went on:

"It'd be impossible for the both of us to leave without being seen… unless…"

He trailed off there, and that's when he quickly left the room, muttering something about 'being back in a minute'.

_The hell's gotten into him?_

* * *

><p>Of course!<p>

It was blatantly obvious to Shoichi now; it would be easy to sneak out of the building if you knew someone whose _specialty_ was stealth. It had evaded him until now that he had a way to sneak out. Even though that would mean telling someone else about the Hana that had appeared here from ten years earlier, it would be worth it… and it was just his luck that this person was someone whom he could trust and vice versa.

Shoichi descaled the stairs and took off at a steady jog toward the kitchen. If there was _anywhere_ that maniac was hiding out at, he'd be in the kitchen. The hallways passed by in a blur, and before he knew it, he was in the dark excess of the kitchen. At first, he could hardly even see a couple of feet in front of him, but that's when he noticed a ball of yellow near the sink. With a much more thorough stare, that 'ball' morphed into individual strands of hair.

"Hey, do you have a minute?"

"Aw, c'mon man; ya know I've always got more than a _minute_, yeah."

Shoichi entered the kitchen, looking around furiously to make sure that this man–the only man that he could trust with this secret–was alone.

"Um…" Shoichi quickly adjusted his glasses to rid his arms of some of his anxiety. "I'm sure you've been wondering where Hana is as well, Silvano?"

The blonde immediately stood erect from what appeared to be washing some dishes and hurried over to Shoichi, furiously swinging his head back and forth.

"You serious? You know where she went, Ecchi? Show me where! I gotta go 'nd–"

"A-ah! Would you stop calling me 'hentai' and listen? This is important! _Yes_, I think I know where she went, but you're going to have to keep one hell of a secret for me…"

* * *

><p>I had waited patiently until a minute morphed into two and soon into five and had almost reached ten when rapid footsteps began up the stairs. My first instinct was to hide, but the door exploded open to reveal a tall, blonde man who stared at me expectantly.<p>

"So! What Ecchi tells me is true, ain't it?" He asked, sizing me up three times in one second before allowing his blue eyes to wander to my dark eyes and a gigantic smile spread across his face. "Missy's back from the past!"

_The hell is this guy and why is he so familiar with me? What did older-me DO to get THIS guy to follow her around?_

"Okay, Hana, this guy is going to help us sneak out. His name's Silvano, so…" Shoichi trailed off for a moment, appearing to be thinking over his plan once more.

"Have ya met me in the past yet, missy?" The blonde asked impatiently, but I shook my head, a stinging retort resting on my tongue. "Nope. Am I supposed to?"

"Well, yeah! Otherwise, you'll be missin' out on all'a this!" 'Silvano' began to point at himself at all different angles, throwing his arms around almost carelessly and nearly smacking Shoichi across the face.

"_Alright_," Shoichi finally spoke up, adjusting his glasses for the umpteenth time. "That's enough of _that_…"

"Ecchi," Silvano immediately turned his attention to the redhead, who rose his eyebrows and ignored the terrible nickname. "Where do ya want me to take ya two?"

"Why in the world do you call him that?" I asked, ready for any answer in the book at this point.

_I can't even come up with an excuse for that!__  
><em>

Silvano whipped around to me, sticking me with a creepily-friendly smile, but before he could answer, Shoichi cut into the conversation.

"We're not supposed to tell her too much, Silvano… _and_ we have to get on-topic. The three of us are–as far as I know–the only ones who know that Hana is here from the past."

"What about Dante?" I asked quietly, and Shoichi audibly stifled a sigh, giving me the most exasperated look I'd seen in all of my days knowing him and the younger him.

"Dante's got the attention span of an iPod at 1% battery life," Shoichi shot back at me quickly before getting back on track. "Long story short, I have a plan that I've devised to get time to straighten itself out and hopefully we can get this over and done before anyone realizes that we're missing."

"What exactly would _that_ be, nerd?" I asked impatiently, watching Shoichi shut his eyes and mumble something underneath his breath.

"Man!" Silvano laughed dramatically, placing his hand over his mouth to stop the sound from travelling. "She's still got it, Ecchi! If I'm allowed to say this, missy, ya ain't gonna change that in the future!"

Shoichi closed his eyes briefly once more, but he shook his head and continued his sentence: "We _have_ to get started before anyone realizes that we're gone. We have to go find the one who I think can fix all of this."

"Ya ain't tell me ya knew another time-traveler," Silvano crossed his arms across his chest. "What else ya been holdin' out on, Ecchi?"

"Quit calling me 'hentai'!" Shoichi fumed.

His face was beginning to turn an unappetizing color of salmon, and I distracted the two from each other as quickly and harmlessly as I could:

"How does someone fix time?"

"Well," Shoichi started, glancing behind himself at the door before lowering his voice. "I don't know if he knows how to _fix_ time, but he knows how it works. He's done it before; fixed time… but he's also nearly destroyed it, too… and I can't say we're even on good terms…"

"Well? Get on with it, Ecchi. What are you saying?" Silvano yawned, sneaking me a rascally glance.

I couldn't resist a snicker, and Shoichi pressed his lips together as if he was forcefully preventing himself from saying anything else, but he soon parted them into a sentence that invited my sass to the conversation once more.

"I'm _saying_ that we need to pay an old friend of mine a visit."

"You have friends?" I raised an eyebrow, waiting for a reaction from my childhood friend, but he only seemed to suppress whatever he felt from what I had said.

"Who's the guy?" Silvano looked genuinely interested now, leaning into the space between he and Shoichi expectantly.

"…Well…"

Shoichi glanced from me to Silvano quickly, until he decided against what was probably his better judgment and uttered a name… one that, just with the _mention_ of it, seemed to freeze time:

"Byakuran."

* * *

><p><em><span>Q&amp;A:<span>_

**What was that about Byakuran? He and Shoichi are friends, right?**

Well, I've changed things around a little bit in a way. In this TYL (or at least, at this point), the black/white spells have dispersed. That's all I can say right now without spoiling my plot, but you get the gist.

**Where exactly is she in the TYL timeline?**

I'm (almost) making my stuff up (because… AU) and I'd like to say it's definitely after Tsuna's who spew with Byakuran and Yuni dying (aka, canon-TYL) at _**this**_ point in TYL (aka, this isn't _all_ I've got planned). That's where this is going to start getting AU-ish to the maximum capacity of AU.

**How long is this arc going to be?**

I really don't want to expand on all of this too much (because it'd be spoilers for Hana and for the plot) but I want it to be between three and five chapters. No more, no less. This chapter would be chapter two of this arc, by the way. I never intended on this arc to be long, so yeah. After all, the next arc is _really_ important to the exposition and I need to get to it.

**Wow, why is Shoichi so vague?**

Well, unless you wanted him to tell you the plot, I guess vagueness is the closest I can do to hinting _unless_ I decided to foreshadow (which this arc is literally one heap of 'overshadowing'). Haha, no seriously, sorry guys. Vagueness is Shoichi's specialty.

**Why are you so bad at being funny?**

Because my humor is so weird and no one else thinks it's funny. At least I'm _trying_; unlike in the last version where I _knew_ I wasn't funny so I just… didn't. I'm funny in real life, but I figured that my (odd) humor is _probably_ not appropriate for this story.

**What even is Silvano?**

To be honest, _I'm_ not even sure. I know some of you are glad that I brought him back, and new readers, prepare for him and his out-of-control. It sort-of just… happened. I couldn't even _think_ about pulling him from the short line-up of OCs in this story because he is probably the most successful OC I've ever made. Welcome back to an old friend c:

**What is with Silvano's nickname to Shoichi? Why would you **_**do**_** that?**

Man, I was feeling creative, so I was like 'let's be funny!' and I decided that ecchi (pronounced eh-chee, I believe) would be a good one. I couldn't stop thinking about how the ending of "Shoichi" (the "chi" I guess) reminded me of it and I… I _had_ to. I don't think I need to explain any further and if you still don't get it _**PLEASE**_ use incognito mode on Google. We don't want the government to laugh at how much of a weeb you are. (lmao I'm kidding don't kill me!) (no seriously) (and before you ask, no I don't look at stuff what are you taking me for are you serious reader really)

* * *

><p><span><em>Author's Notes:<em>

_I __**wanted**__ to make this one longer, but because I shaved a little bit off of this one, next chapter will __**definitely**__ be longer._

I don't have much to say this time around other than I am beyond proud of myself for coming out with this rewrite and that it is probably light-years above the previous version. It has also given me a chance to rethink some of my plot so that things can run a little more smoothly this time! It is also thanks to my readers who review every chapter that I find the strength to keep surprising you all and keep up my originality. Thank you all once more! :D

Reviews are a blessing upon this story and recommend this to your friends (because getting new readers is always fun for both the author _and_ the reader)!

Thank you in advance to all who review/alert/and favorite this story! Thank you for all of the support you've all already given me! :D

(Don't forget the special thanks that I have in my heart for those who have drawn me fanart of their own accord!)

((I apologize for all of the thanks; I'm just so grateful for all of the support I've gotten for writing this story, you know?))

~Teafully~


	6. Amaryllis

**Posted: **November 21st, 2014

**Times Edited: **1

**Last Edited: **November 29th, 2014

**Thank you to user Nakamura Misheru for being my 50****th**** reviewer! :D**

~Rain~

_Warning: foul language, more weapons, more characters, more Silvano (lmao), longer chapter, and __**my switch back to first-person that I elaborated on more in the Q&A section.**_

* * *

><p><em><span>Flashback:<span>_

_"Who's the guy?" Silvano looked genuinely interested now, leaning into the space between he and Shoichi expectantly._

_"…Well…"_

_Shoichi glanced from me to Silvano quickly, until he decided against what was probably his better judgment and uttered a name… one that, just with the mention of it, seemed to freeze time:_

_"Byakuran."_

* * *

><p><span>Chapter Six: Amaryllis<span>

_The Amaryllis flower is a rare species; only two different flowers are categorized underneath this title. It is funnel-shaped and can have anywhere from two to twelve petals on it. These flowers are generally crimson with a pink, purple, or white in them. They get the color because of the veins that run through their petals. Named after a shepherdess countless years ago in its own Mythological tale, Amaryllis translated into English will give you the word 'pride'. Generally, it is a flower that you would give to those whom you deeply care about. They are also known as Naked Ladies and the Belladonna Lily._

_Meaning:_ _pride, determination and/or radiant beauty._

* * *

><p>"Byakuran?"<p>

I echoed the words that came out of Shoichi's mouth. Hardly anything that he was saying was making any sense in my warped mind anymore; time travel and fixing time were things that I knew to be absolutely _impossible_, and even attempting to do something so large-scale could destroy _everything._

"He's an old friend of mine, but that doesn't matter now," Shoichi had finished his sentence hastily, disregarding the confusion that surrounded his seemingly-solo decision. "I've got an idea of how to get you back to the past and we're going to need to work together on this one."

Silvano had been somewhat casually listening, constantly wiggling his fingers into and out of his pockets as if he had something to say wiliest listening, but after Shoichi turned to him, Silvano shrugged as if he was waiting for him to take over.

"We're going to have to sneak out, so if Silvano could–"

"Ah man," Silvano sighed deeply. "I know the drill, Ecchi."

I waited, watching the two grown men exchange glances like they knew something that I didn't, but I held my tongue. It didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that this situation was already tense enough without my input.

Silvano quickly moved to my side, taking my wrist and gently squeezing it before Shoichi turned to the door.

"Alright, we're going to go over there, but we _have_ to be quiet. If _Gio_ sees you, Silvano, it's over."

"But," I gritted my teeth as Silvano's grip tightened around my wrist. "What the hell is this guy doing?"

Shoichi turned around once more, cracking open the door. "He's about to help you sneak out of here undetected. Please don't talk until we're outside; we can't risk the others hearing us leave."

I suppressed a deep sigh as I advanced forward with Silvano's hand clenched around my thin wrist, his fingers pulsing as if they were my secondary heartbeat.

_How in the hell are you going to help us sneak out?_

The question seemed to resonate just above my head, swirling as the three of us descended the dark, creaky staircase down to what seemed to be the ground floor. Since Shoichi hadn't bothered to explain much (well, _anything_ really…), things were beginning to fall apart. The strings of logic that tied this whole world together were starting to snap piece by piece.

"Ain't an idiot, missy. I know what you're thinkin'; ain't nobody can see the two of us. Not even Ecchi, yeah. _We're_ _invisible together_."

I was tempted, even if it was for just a moment, to ignore Silvano entirely. My self-control, however, became trampled underneath the need to say _something_ in the tense situation we were in.

"Sure, whatever makes you feel better," I mused, cracking beneath his grip. "I don't see how you can somehow make us invisible without even trying. I've got nothing else to lose, so as long as you don't get me _killed_, I guess I'm stuck with you."

Silvano closed the door behind me so forcefully that the gust of wind it created flew through my hair, faintly ruffling it.

"Think I'm lyin'? I'll show ya! Ecchi, come 'ere, real quick! Missy's a non-believer!"

The pair of us watched as Shoichi stopped in his tracks and lifted his red head into the ceiling in exasperation, as if he was searching for an extraterrestrial being to come down from the sky and save him from the idiot who thinks that we're both invisible.

"C'mon!" Silvano begged quietly, but the urgency in his voice was obvious. "Lemme take a look at your glasses! They're almost like a mirror sometimes, yeah!"

Reluctantly, Shoichi turned around and removed his glasses, blinking as if he had a hard time adjusting without having them on his face, but nonetheless, he parted with them and Silvano took them in his one free hand, holding them up to the closest light source which happened to be down the hall.

"See, missy? Can ya see us in the glasses?"

I squinted at the glass that would, under any normal circumstance, show both Silvano and I in its reflection, but instead there was nothing but the floor beneath us and the dark wallpaper behind us.

"Told ya! Alrighty, Ecchi, let's get a move on before anyone notices that we're here!"

Shoichi took a hold of his glasses and gently placed them on his face once more, and let out a quick sigh, but he didn't seem to acknowledge Silvano and continued to forge a path forward.

_This is just getting weirder and weirder. I'm either tripping balls or I'm dreaming this whole thing up._

In all honesty, there was no plausible way that I could actually be invisible, but at the same time… I just saw it. It was there. I cannot be seen by anyone but the big oaf beside me, who also happened to be invisible.

"What the ever-loving _fuck_ do you think you're doing?"

I stopped immediately, sucking in my breath until I was sure that I would fall to the floor. The deep voice reached to my soul as Shoichi stopped. While, from the back, he did not seem to be afraid, I could hear his voice shake:

"I'm going for a stroll."

Shock wore itself off as Silvano swore underneath his breath, but a dark man soon came into view.

"A _stroll_? We're on lockdown and we _have_ been for the past _week_. You, of _all_ people, should abide by your own rules, Shoichi."

His voice was liquid; it rushed by just as quick as it came, but its depth was astounding. The ease of which he spoke was quick and quiet, but he made no mess of his words and made no unnecessary sounds. The sharp blue eyes that he possessed narrowed as he seemed to stare straight through Shoichi. The man shifted, allowing the sword on his back to twitch slightly and clang inside of its sheath. As quickly as the danger escalated, the man backed off from Shoichi the same way that he had gotten onto his case:

"Whatever. Your business isn't mine, I guess. Be back soon, before anyone _else_ sees you. You too, Silvano. Dumb bastard."

In that same instant, those piercing eyes wandered over where an invisible Silvano and I stood, surveying him first, but allowing his eyes to wander over me for a mere moment before slipping by the two of us without looking back.

"Invisible my ass!" I huffed, staring up at Silvano.

"Hush, missy!" Silvano nudged me, almost flinging me into the wall. "You wanna get _everyone_ in the vicinity of this place over 'ere? B'sides, it ain't my fault. Gio _always_ sees straight through my tricks! Kid's a psychic! Man, there was this one time–!"

"I _thought_ I told you to not let Gio see you, Silvano," Shoichi asked, turning his head Silvano's way. "You're just lucky he knows when to keep his mouth shut. He won't give us away. Let's go, before anyone _else_ sees you two."

* * *

><p>"Yeah, fresh air! When's the last time we got fresh air, Ecchi?"<p>

Silvano flung his free arm over his head in delight, cracking each and every joint in it before taking in a deep breath. Shoichi even seemed less tense as we continued to walk down the street.

"Be careful. If you see anything out of place, let me know. Follow as closely behind me as you can get, and avoid pedestrians when you can."

The businesslike tone of which he spoke in was almost as if he was completely submerged in our mission… so much so that he didn't even turn back to look at us.

"Is he always like that?" I asked Silvano, who shrugged. "Ya get used to it after a while. I think he's just worried 'bout all the bad things that could happen."

Shoichi's posture gave off every warning sign in the book that Silvano was absolutely right. His hands were clasped inside of his pockets as he walked with his head held high, but I could tell that it was forced. The Shoichi that I had come to know would have walked with his head down, but this one, the older one, walked straight ahead as if he was ready to face hell.

"S'ides, Ecchi's gotta lot on his mind. I mean, I would too if–"

"I thought I told you to not tell her too much," Shoichi turned around this time, glaring at Silvano as his hands clenched into fists. "This is serious. We're dealing with changing history _and_ the future. Screw _that_ up, and things might turn out worse than they already are!"

I watched a flicker of worry flutter across Shoichi's face, but he turned around and composed himself before starting forward again.

"Now, let's hurry before anyone thinks that I'm just talking to myself."

The rest of our journey was cloaked in utter silence. The only sounds that I could hear above the usual civilian traffic were Shoichi's footsteps and Silvano's breathing. The voyage on foot was getting ridiculous; my bare feet were beginning to ache after stepping on multiple cigarette butts and narrowly avoiding a broken bottle on the sidewalk. I still hadn't recognized this part of town, even though Shoichi had told me that we were still in Namimori. Silvano's hand was beginning to get sweaty the harder that he held onto my wrist, but I almost couldn't feel that over the prospect that something wasn't quite right.

_Something feels out of place, but I don't know what it is. Maybe I'm just a little loopy because I'm starting to wake up from this asinine dream of mine._

My sarcasm toward myself was getting a bit old, since Silvano and I didn't talk due to the request by Shoichi.

We stopped at the entrance to a large gym-like building that reached multiple stories high into the air. All of the windows appeared to be tinted… possibly even one-way. The white marble with which it was built shone in the pale sun that peeked out from behind the faint clouds.

"Stay here."

Shoichi ordered both Silvano and I, but before I could protest and ask a couple of well-deserved questions, Silvano pulled me away and toward a space between the two buildings that we stood next to.

"What is he doing; going over there by himself?"

I struggled to watch what was taking place in front of my eyes; Shoichi was making his way toward the large building, continuing to keep up his calm demeanor.

"It ain't the first time, missy. Calm down; he's tryna determine if we can make our way into there without stirrin' up too much trouble."

I bit back a retort as I forced myself to watch Shoichi approach the building, but cut right and down an adjacent street before he could even get too close to the door.

"Looks like they're packin' heat, missy. Musta seen us comin' somehow." Silvano's face was curled into a frown and his eyebrows knitted themselves together as he appeared to be thinking. "I ain't know what we're gonna do. Ya can't fight 'nd we can't leave ya anywhere."

"_Fight?_" I almost choked on my own spit at the mere _suggestion_. "What do you mean _fight_? I'm sure walking right through the door and politely asking to see this Byakuran guy might work if you're polite enough…?"

Silvano stared at me as if he was just as appalled at my suggestion as I was to his, wiping his forehead with his spare hand. "Man, Ecchi's makin' everything harder than it needs to be, yeah. The things I could tell you 'bout the future you right now, missy…"

I dwelled on that for a moment, wondering what exactly was on his mind. I wanted to know what would become of me in my later years so that I could prepare and make sure not to do certain things to get ahead, but that moment was gone as Shoichi approached us from the back, glancing behind himself anxiously.

"Ecchi, did ya get followed back here?"

"I don't think so," Shoichi panted, but he took a deep breath before going on: "I got close enough to see a camera. They've been waiting for us, I'm sure. I didn't want to get the others involved, but at this rate, we may have no choice. The only way we'll even come _close_ to Byakuran is if we bring the others for backup."

I waited for an explanation of what he had just said, but that was when I realized that there wasn't one.

* * *

><p>"Okay, I'll get the others and then we'll all formulate a plan together. You both should wait in the basement so that we can talk and be uninterrupted."<p>

Shoichi instructed Silvano and I as we hustled to another mahogany door that didn't seem to be used much.

"Sure, Ecchi. You think this'll work; getting them to believe us about what just happened?"

It was as if an unspoken thought passed between the two of them as Silvano forced me behind him and onto the first step.

"It has to," Shoichi muttered, hustling up to gather the 'others', whoever they may be.

Silvano turned on the light, using one of those old pull-down switches that lit up a single lamp that lit up the stairs just enough so that I could see where I was putting my feet. When I hit the bottom of the stairs, cold cement chilled me up to my elbows and I stood in absolute darkness, unsure which way to go, until Silvano flipped another switch and a comfortable room appeared before me. There were three beds in the far corner, furthest away from the door. It looked as if they had been once shielded by a curtain, but it seemed to be draped between the concrete wall and a dresser. There were no windows, and I watched Silvano make his way toward the main focus of the room; a table with eight seats surrounding it.

"Had some good times down here, yeah… c'mon. You sit at the end," Silvano told me, comfortably taking a seat across from me. I couldn't even ask what he meant by 'good times' as he continued on: "So missy; you excited 'bout what we're gonna do?"

"Which is…?"

"We gonna fight, more than likely. That's the only way to get through to those people."

Silvano's eyes lit up at the prospect of the fight and he even appeared to be a bit antsy. It was almost terrifying; I couldn't even imagine fighting right now… much less fighting to make my way back to the present.

"I–"

Just as I had begun to speak, the clamber of footsteps walking down the old, rickety stairs. Voices floated down from the cracks in the wall, echoing in the concrete room around me:

"One at a damn time!" Someone with a gruff voice growled. "If y'all are gonna get on the stairs at the same time, it'll collapse!"

"I want to see if this beanstalk-lookin' ginger's telling the truth!" The recognizable voice of my almost-murderer, Dante, echoed above the groans of despair. "I'm not about to waste my goddamn time for this today!"

"Calm down," A genderless voice spoke up, appearing to have directed this comment toward Dante, whom I knew was a problem in and of himself. "I'm sure if we all just went down one at a time…"

"Morons!" A feminine voice shouted. "Let's get a move on! No one can go when you're all blocking the way!"

"_**Move**_," The voice of the man who had seen both Silvano and I even though we were invisible spoke up. "I'll push _all_ of you pieces of shit down the stairs so that you'll see he's telling the damn truth."

I watched Silvano lean back as the bickering continued. "Yup, they're always like this. What a noisy lot. Glad I ain't over there. Last time we broke the stairs, Kim got mad at me. Ain't even my fault neither; it was that damn Gio swingin' his sword 'round like it's a toy."

_What's going on? Are we really going to fight this Byakuran guy over me? As if I'll politely ask these guys what the hell they can do to send me back to the past. At least things made sense there!_

"Acting like a bunch of stubborn stuck-together Legos!" Shoichi snapped audibly as the stairs creaked once again. "If you all could stop bickering for a minute, then I'd be able to explain it to you!"

Shoichi was the first to step down from the stairs, followed by more people, most of which I could not recognize. The only ones who stood out for me was the gun-crazed Dante and the calm and cool guy whose eyes pierced my soul.

"What the–?" Dante stopped as he spotted me, his eyebrows scrunching up like a man who was desperately trying to see what he looked like in the mirror with a unibrow. "Why the hell are _you_ still here?"

"You done goofed, son." The deep, sarcastic voice of the piercing man gruffly laughed. "How could you _not_ notice that there's your boss? And here I was beginning to think your intelligence was on its _upslope_."

I tuned out of the conversation, wondering what I was witnessing.

_Boss? Of what? _

The question wanted to pop out of my mouth like a nearly-swallowed Jolly Rancher, but I quickly decided that this was not the time to question something that was probably off-limits according to Shoichi.

"Pulling a gun on the boss, tsk tsk," a person with long brown hair and a little braid on one side laughed at Dante. "I can't believe you threatened her life!"

"Aight, we ain't got no time for this," Silvano spoke up, leaning backward in his chair. "Everybody take a seat 'nd help Shoichi figure somethin' out 'fore his head explodes."

Quickly, everyone seemed to migrate toward different chairs, almost as if they had a seating chart or something of the sort. Shoichi made his way to sit next to me, hardly even sharing a glance with me as he immediately got down to business.

"What should we do to get into Byakuran's heavily-guarded "office" building? We can't just waltz in; he'd see us coming half a mile away."

"C'mon, Shoichi," another dark man grumbled, stretching from the far side of the table. "Give us a break. Besides, we've got the boss to say hello to from the past!"

I watched eyes settle on me and I naturally shriveled up under the expectant gazes of these people, most of whom I had no idea who they were.

_It doesn't make it any easier when you have no idea what the hell they're talking about!_

"She looks so much younger!" A blonde woman gushed, placing her finger on her lip, showing off her red nail polish as the light hit it just right.

"No shit, Kim," the dark man who had just interrupted Shoichi rolled his eyes, scratching his beardless face. "She _is_ younger."

"If you don't mind," the piercing blue eyes darted from me to Dante. "Dante has something to say."

I waited as Dante appeared to have swallowed some of his pride, albeit it obviously wouldn't completely go down.

"…Sorry. It's your _own_ fault, you know? Why didn't you just _tell_ me–"

"It's kinda difficult to talk calmly to someone when they're waving a gun in front of your face," I shot back, waiting for this guy's anger to resurface just as I had expected. Instead, he submitted and tore his gaze away from mine and set his golden eyes on the table.

"If you're all done," Shoichi was beginning to get antsy as he sat beside me. "We've got an issue to resolve. We're going to need to speak with Byakuran because I believe he is the only one who can set time back to the way that it was. I think he's been expecting trouble, so what the hell are we supposed to do to bypass it without causing a problem?"

The room was silent, and only the sound of Silvano tapping his fingers against the hollowing wooden table remained. The light above us flickered faintly as if it wished to go out, but it did no such thing as a timid hand rose.

"We could rappel down from a helicopter onto the top of the building. There's no way that they'd see us coming that way."

"The hell are we gonna get a helicopter, boy?" Silvano shot a glare down the table, ceasing tapping his fingers on the wood. "We ain't _that_ rich. They'd hear us comin' 'fore ya had the chance to pull out them ropes."

The person with the helicopter idea quickly looked down at their hands, shying away as if they immediately regretted their decision to speak out.

"How about we go on the flip-side of that?" I asked, rising my voice enough to be heard. "We could go underneath the building instead."

"How in the _hell_ are we gonna pull that off?" The intense eyes of the man who had appeared to recognize me in the hallway earlier that day turned to me. "It's not like we've got a drill hiding up our asses that we can pull out anytime we want to use it."

"Just throwing out suggestions," I mumbled under my breath. "It's not like there's any _other_ way to get in except for through the front door."

The atmosphere in the room was beginning to tighten, almost as if everyone present drew in their breath at the same moment. The situation didn't bother me once I accepted that I was nowhere close to younger-Shoichi's closet that I so thought I would still be in after touching that slick metal-thing in the box that he specifically stated not to touch.

"That might just be our only option," Shoichi stood up from his seat and accentuated his point using his finger to draw an imaginary diagram. "Byakuran's place has six floors. I'm sure you're all familiar with that. Last time we tried to get in, it didn't work out so well. We've got to try a different method and stick with it."

"Through the front door? Ya crazy, Ecchi?" Silvano stared at him unbelievably. "Ya tryna get us killed out there? This dude ain't seem like an idiot to me, so I ain't 'boutta do somethin' stupid hoping to get past 'em."

"I know," Shoichi quickly addressed what Silvano said. "You're right. He isn't stupid, and he's far from it. However, I think he might know exactly why we're there in the first place. We have to try something, or we'll screw up time even more than it already has been screwed up."

I waited for someone else to say something, but the entire room appeared to be completely silent. No one seemed to have an idea in their head about how to get out of this dilemma that seemed to affect me the most.

_If I had something to offer to the table, I would! It's not like I know a thing about what's happening in the future, thanks to Shoichi, and I don't know how this Byakuran-guy operates at all! Besides… I don't know why they're so quick to get hostile._

The entire situation confused the hell out of me; nothing made sense because I had no context. The fighting didn't seem necessary at all, but there had to be a reason as to why they were so quick to resort to it.

"I'm just ready to go home," I admitted, giving up due to my own lack of ideas. It seemed desperate and almost whiny, but I got past the point of caring. "Whatever you've got, all of you, just get it over with."

"Alright, that settles it. We're doing this _tonight_." Shoichi stood up and cracked his neck, quickly putting his glasses back into place. "We have to _break in_."

* * *

><p><em><span>Q&amp;A:<span>_

**Why is your AU so confusing?**

I'm trying my best to make it somewhat follow-able, but it isn't too easy when there are so many plot-holes in canon as well. I'm trying my absolute best to cover them up believably, so bear with me! D:

**Would you quit writing more stories?**

No.

**Why didn't you just call Byakuran's hideout-thing "Melone Base"?**

Well, I did some research and found out that in the canon!future, Shoichi built Melone base. Obviously, in my AU, he did not. Therefore, I had to quickly edit that outta there and figure something else out. I thought about something intimidating and I thought 'yay big buildings' so… that's what went down. Please be patient with me; there are a lot of holes that need filling, so… I apologize in advance if I get something wrong! D:

**Important:**** Why are you switching back to first-person? I thought you said this was going to be in third…?**

Do you ever just regret your decisions because you thought it would be easier for you but then… _it wasn't?_ Yeah, I noticed how _difficult_ this got to write without making Hana (the main character) seem like a side-character and not have her personality blend to match other people's (which is _exactly_ I tried to avoid). Then, I thought ahead to all of the _really_ personal scenes that I had planned and they wouldn't hit home and make the audience _feel_ _something_ in third-person, so I put a stop to that shit before it turned out like last version where I couldn't make up my mind. Nothing (explicitly) new was added, but if you _really_ wanna go back and reread, go right ahead! I'm sorry for wasting everyone's time lmao don't kill me… but I promise… _no changing. No more. Experimenting is over. Everything's perfect. I'm sorry once again D: seriously I sorry I don't know what I was thinking. __Please__ don't rage at me in the review section I __KNOW__ I feel bad for doing it but I didn't want to screw myself fifty chapters in… but at least I edited it on my own time this time. That's character development in real life._

***yawn* Is this arc almost over?**

Yup! The conclusion is next chapter, and then we're onto something that many of you have been waiting for! :D

* * *

><p><span><em>Author's Notes:<em>

_Important: I'm sorry that this took so long, and I wanted this to be much longer but something came up: my computer charger broke. I'm typing this on minimal battery and I kinda didn't want to delay the chapter any longer than it already had been, so I'll just get done with everything that I can next chapter. I don't know when that will be out though, since my cord is broken and I can't turn on my computer without it. I ask that any errors be excused, as I cannot edit them as of now._

As a Junior, this school year truly is more difficult than before… I'm tired, and not the kind of tired that goes away from sleeping. _HOWEVER_, Flowers lives on!

I can't wait for this arc to be over so I can focus more on the characters rather than the plot, if that makes any sense to anyone… this chapter was particularly difficult.

Also, I started another SI OC for my favorite character ever in the whole of KHR… (cough, Xanxan) uhhhh go check it out I'm actually kinda obsessed with it to the point where I debated whether I should update this story or not in favor of that one sooo… (and thank you to those who have already checked it out!) ((and yeah, I did update it rather than this one because my plot bunnies were harassing me))

The arc is almost over, my friends. I cannot wait for you all to see what I have in store!

That's about it for me… stay tuned for next chapter!

~Teafully~


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